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NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL 


HISTORY  OF  AMERICA 


'aboriginal 

America 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL 

HISTORY  OF  AMERICA 


EDITED 

By  JUSTIN  WINSOR 

LIBRARIAN  OF  HARVARD  UNIVERSITY 
CORRESPONDING  SECRETARY  MASSACHUSETTS  HISTORICAL  SOCIETY 


VOL.  I.— PART  I. 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY 

SDlic  lutierstDc  press,  Cambnosc 


Copyright,  1889, 

By  HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY. 

All  rights  reserved. 


The  Riverside  Press , Cambridge,  Mass.,  U.  S.  A. 
ELctrotyped  and  Printed  by  H.  0.  Houghton  and  Company. 


To 


CHARLES  WILLIAM  ELIOT,  LL.  D. 


President  of  Harvard  University. 


Dear  Eliot: 

Forty  years  ago , you  and  1 \ having  made* preparation  together , entered  college 
on  the  same  day.  We  later  found  different  spheres  in  the  world;  and  you  came 
back  to  Cambridge  in  due  time  to  assume  your  high  office.  Twelve  years  ago, 
sought  by  you,  I likewise  came , to  discharge  a duty  under  you. 

You  took  me  away  from  many  cares,  and  transferred  me  to  the  more  con- 
genial service  of  the  University.  The  change  has  conduced  to  the  progress  of 
those  studies  in  which  I hardly  remember  to  have  had  a lack  of  interest. 

So  I owe  much  to  you  ; and  it  is  not,  I trust,  surprising  that  I desire  to  con- 
nect, in  this  work,  your  name  with  that  of  your 

Obliged  friend. 


Cambridge,  1889. 


CONTENTS  AND  ILLUSTRATIONS. 


[ The  cut  on  the  title  represents  a mask,  which  forms  the  centre  of  the  Mexican  Calendar  Stone,  as  engraved 
in  D.  Wilson's  Prehistoric  Man,  i.  333,  from  a cast  now  in  the  Collection  of  the  Society  of  Antiquaries 
of  Scotland .] 


INTRODUCTION. 

Part  I.  Americana  in  Libraries  and  Bibliographies.  The  Editor i 

Illustrations:  Portrait  of  Professor  Ebeling,  iii;  of  James  Carson  Brevoort,  x ; of 
Charles  Deane,  xi. 

Part  II.  Early  Descriptions  of  America,  and  Collective  Accounts  of  the  Early 

Voyages  thereto.  The  Editor xix 

Illustrations:  Title  of  the  Ncwe  Unbckanthe  Landte,  xxi ; of  Peter  Martyr’s  De  Nuper 
sub  D.  Carolo  rcpertis  insulis  (1521),  xxii ; Portrait  of  Grynaeus,  xxiv ; of  Sebastian 
Munster,  xxvi,  xxvii ; of  Monardes,  xxix  ; of  De  Bry,  xxx ; of  Feyerabend,  xxxL 


CHAPTER  I. 

The  Geographical  Knowledge  of  the  Ancients  considered  in  Relation  to  the 

Discovery  of  America.  William  H.  Tillinghast 1 

Illustrations:  Maps  by  Macrobius,  10,  11,  12;  Carli’s  Traces  of  Atlantis,  17;  Sanson’s 
Atlantis  Insula,  18 ; Bory  de  St.  Vincent’s  Carte  Conjcdurale  de  I'Atlantide,  19 ; Con- 
tour Chart  of  the  Bottom  of  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  20 ; The  Rectangular  Earth,  30. 


Critical  Essay 33 

Notes 38 


A.  The  Form  of  the  Earth,  38;  B.  Homer’s  Geography,  39;  C.  Supposed  References  to 
America,  40 ; D.  Atlantis,  41  ; E.  Fabulous  Islands  of  the  Atlantic  in  the  Middle  Ages, 
46;  F.  Toscanelli’s  Atlantic  Ocean,  51.  G.  (By  the  Editor.)  Early  Maps  of  the  At- 
lantic Ocean,  53. 

Illustrations:  Map  of  the  Fifteenth  Century,  53  ; Map  of  Fr.  Pizigani  (a.  d.  1367),  and 
of  Andreas  Bianco  (1436),  54;  Catalan  Map  (1375),  55;  Map  of  Andreas  Benincasa 
(1476),  56  ; Laon  Globe,  56 ; Maps  of  Bordone  (1547),  57,  58 ; Map  made  at  the  End  of 
the  Fifteenth  Century,  57  ; Ortelius’s  Atlantic  Ocean  (1587),  58. 


CHAPTER  II. 

Pre-Columbian  Explorations.  Justin  Winsor 59 

Illustrations:  Norse  Ship,  62;  Plan  of  a Viking  Ship,  and  her  Rowlock,  63;  Norse 
Boat  used  as  a Habitation,  64 ; Norman  Ship  from  the  Bayeux  Tapestry,  64 ; Scandinavian 


vm 


CONTENTS  AND  ILLUSTRATIONS. 


Flags,  64;  Scandinavian  Weapons,  65;  Runes,  66,  67;  Fac-simile  of  the  Title  of  the 
Zeno  Narrative,  70;  Its  Section  on  Frisland,  71;  Ship  of  the  Fifteenth  Century,  73; 
The  Sea  of  Darkness,  74. 

Critical  Notes 

< 

A.  Early  Connection  of  Asiatic  Peoples  with  the  Western  Coast  of  America,  76;  B.  Ireland 
the  Great,  or  White  Man’s  Land,  82  ; C.  The  Norse  in  Iceland,  83;  D.  Greenland  and  its 
Ruins,  85;  E.  The  Vinland  Voyages,  87;  F.  The  Lost  Greenland  Colonies,  107;  G. 
Madoc  and  the  Welsh,  109;  H.  The  Zeni  and  their  Map,  in  ; I.  Alleged  Jewish  Migra- 
tion, 1 15;  j.  Possible  Early  African  Migrations,  116. 

Illustrations  : Behring’s  Sea  and  Adjacent  Waters,  77 ; Buache’s  Map  of  the  North 
Pacific  and  Fusang,  79 ; Ruins  of  the  Church  at  Kakortok,  86  ; Fac-simile  of  a Saga 
Manuscript  and  Autograph  of  C.  C.  Rafn,  87 ; Ruin  at  Kakortok,  88  ; Map  of  Juliane- 
haab,  89;  Portrait  of  Rafn,  90  ; Title-page  of  Historia  Vinlandia  Antigua  per  Thor- 
modum  Torfaum,  91  ; Rafn’s  Map  of  Norse  America,  95  ; Rafn’s  Map  of  Vinland  (New 
England),  100  ; View  of  Dighton  Rock,  101  ; Copies  of  its  Inscription,  103  ; Hennk  Rink, 
106;  Fac-simile  of  the  Title-page  of  Hans  Egede’s  Dct  gamle  Gronlands  nye  Pcrlus- 
tration,  108;  A British  Ship  of  the  Time  of  Edward  I,  no;  Richard  H.  Major,  112; 
Baron  Nordenskjold,  113. 

The  Cartography  of  Greenland.  The  Editor 

Illustrations:  The  Maps  of  Claudius  Clavus  (1427),  118,119;  of  Fra  Mauro  (1459),  120; 
Tabula  Regionum  Septentrionalium  (1467),  121  ; Map  of  Donis  (1482),  122;  of  Henricus 
Martellus  (1489-90),  122;  of  Olaus  Magnus  (1539),  123  ; (1555),  124;  (1567),  125;  of 
Bordone  (1547),  126 ; The  Zeno  Map,  127  ; as  altered  in  the  Ptolemy  of  1561,  128 ; The 
Map  of  Phillipus  Gallaeus  (1585),  129;  of  Sigurd  Stephanus  (1570),  130;  The  Greenland 
of  Paul  Egede,  131  ; of  Isaac  de  la  Peyrfere  (1647),  132. 


CHAPTER  III. 

Mexico  and  Central  America.  Justm  IVinsor 

Illustrations:  Clavigero’s  Plan  of  Mexico,  143;  his  Map  of  Anahuac,  144;  Environs  du 
Lac  de  Mexique,  145 ; Brasseur  de  Bourbourg's  Map  of  Central  America,  151. 

Critical  Essay 

Illustrations:  Manuscript  of  Bernal  Diaz,  154;  Sahagun,  156;  Clavigero,  159 ; Lorenzo 
Boturini,  160;  Frontispiece  of  his  Idea,  with  his  Portrait,  161  ; Icazbalceta,  163  ; Daniel 
G.  Brinton,  165  ; Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  170. 


Notes 

I.  The  Authorities  on  the  so-called  Civilization  of  Ancient  Mexico  and  Adjacent  Lands,  and 
the  Interpretation  of  such  Authorities,  173;  II.  Bibliographical  Notes  upon  the  Ruins 
and  Archaeological  Remains  of- Mexico  and  Central  America,  176;  III.  Bibliographical 
Notes  on  the  Picture-Writing  of  the  Nahuas  and  Mayas,  197. 

Illustrations:  The  Pyramid  of  Cholula,  177;  The  Great  Mound  of  Cholula,  178;  Mex- 
ican Calendar  Stone,  179;  Court  of  the  Mexico  Museum,  i8r  ; Old  Mexican  Bridge  near 
Tezcuco,  182;  The  Indio  Triste,  183  ; General  Plan  of  Mitla,  1S4 ; Sacrificial  Stone.  185  ; 
Waldeck,  186 1 Desire  Charnay,  187;  Charnay’s  Map  of  Yucatan,  18S ; Ruined  Temple 
at  Uxmal,  189;  Ring  and  Head  from  Chichen-Itza,  190;  Viollet-le-Duc’s  Restoration  of 
a Palenqu6  Building,  192;  Sculptures  from  the  Temple  of  the  Cross  at  Palenqu6,  193; 
Plan  of  Copan,  194;  Yucatan  Types  of  Heads,  195  ; Plan  of  Quirigua,  196;  Fac-simile 
of  Landa’s  Manuscript,  198;  A Sculptured  Column,  199;  Palenqu6  Hieroglyphics,  201  ; 
L6on  de  Rosny,  202;  The  Dresden  Codex,  204;  Codex  Cortesianus,  206;  Codex  Perezi- 
anus,  207,  208. 


CONTENTS  AND  ILLUSTRATIONS. 


IX 


CHAPTER  IV. 

The  Inca  Civilization  in  Peru.  Clements  R.  Markham 209 

Illustrations:  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg’s  Map  of  Northwestern  South  America,  210; 

Early  Spanish  Map  of  Peru,  21 1 ; Llamas,  213  ; Architectural  Details  at  Tiahuanaca,  214 ; 
Bas-Reliefs,  215  ; Doorway  and  other  Parts,  216;  Image,  217;  Broken  Doorway,  218 ; 
Tiahuanaca  Restored,  219;  Ruins  of  Sacsahuaman,  220;  Inca  Manco  Ccapac,  228;  Inca 
Yupanqui,  228;  Cuzco,  229;  Warriors  of  the  Inca  Period,  230;  Plan  of  the  Temple  of 
the  Sun,  234 ; Zodiac  of  Gold,  235  ; Quipus,  243  ; Inca  Skull,  244 ; Ruins  at  Chucuito, 

245  ; Lake  Titicaca,  246,  247 ; Map  of  the  Lake,  248  ; Primeval  Tomb,  Acora,  249 ; Ruins 
at  Quellenata,  249  ; Ruins  at  Escoma,  250  ; Sillustani,  250;  Ruins  of  an  Incarial  Village, 

251 ; Map  of  the  Inca  Road,  254 ; Peruvian  Metal-Workers,  256  ; Peruvian  Pottery,  256, 

257;  Unfinished  Peruvian  Cloth,  258. 

Critical  Essay 259 

Illustrations  : House  in  Cuzco  in  which  Garcilasso  was  bom,  265  ; Portraits  of  the  Incas 
in  the  Title-page  of  Herrera,  267;  William  Robertson,  269;  Clements  R.  Markham,  272; 
MSrcos  Jimenez  de  la  Espada,  274. 


Notes 275 

I.  Ancient  People  of  the  Peruvian  Coast,  275  ; II.  The  Quichua  Language  and  Literature, 

278. 

Illustrations  : Mummy  from  Ancon,  276  ; Mummy  from  a Huaca  at  Pisco,  277 ; Tapestry 
from  the  Graves  of  Ancon,  278;  Idol  from  Timand,  281. 


CHAPTER  V. 

The  Red  Indian  of  North  America  in  Contact  with  the  French  and  English. 


George  E.  Ellis 283 

Critical  Essay.  George  E.  Ellis  and  the  Editor 316 


CHAPTER  VI. 

The  Prehistoric  Archeology  of  North  America.  Henry  IV.  Haynes 329 

Illustrations  : Palaeolithic  Implement  from  the  Trenton  Gravels,  331 ; The  Trenton  Gravel 
Bluff,  335  ; Section  of  Bluff  near  Trenton,  338;  Obsidian  Spear  Point  from  the  Lahontan 
Lake,  349. 

The  Progress  of  Opinion  respecting  the  Origin  and  Antiquity  of  Man  in 

America.  Justin  IVinsor 369 

Illustrations:  Benjamin  Smith  Barton,  371 ; Louis  Agassiz,  373;  Samuel  Foster  Haven, 

374;  Sir  Daniel  Wilson,  375  ; Professor  Edward  B.  Tylor,  376;  Hochelagan  and  Cro- 
magnon  Skulls,  377 ; Theodor  Waitz,  378;  Sir  John  Lubbock,  379;  Sir  John  William 
Dawson,  380;  Map  of  Aboriginal  Migrations,  381 ; Calaveras  Skull,  385;  Ancient  Foot- 
print from  Nicaragua,  386 ; Cromagnon,  Enghis,  Neanderthal,  and  Hochelagan  Skulls, 

3S9 ; Oscar  Peschel,  391 ; Jeffries  Wyman,  392 ; Map  of  Cape  Cod,  showing  Shell  Heaps, 

393 ; Maps  of  the  Pueblo  Region,  394,  397 ; Col.  Charles  Whittlesey,  399 ; Increase  A. 
Lapham,  400  ; Plan  of  the  Great  Serpent  Mound,  401  ; Cincinnati  Tablet,  404 ; Old  View 
of  the  Mounds  on  the  Muskingum  (Marietta),  405  ; Map  of  the  Scioto  Valley,  showing 
Sites  of  Mounds,  406 ; Works  at  Newark,  Ohio,  407 ; Major  J.  W.  Powell,  41 1. 


X 


CONTENTS  AND  ILLUSTRATIONS. 


APPENDIX. 


Justin  Winsor. 

L Bibliography  of  Aboriginal  America 413 

II.  The  Comprehensive  Treatises  on  American  Antiquities 415 

III.  Bibliographical  Notes  on  the  Industries  and  Trade  of  the  American  Aborigines 4t6 

IV.  Bibliographical  Notes  on  American  Linguistics 421 

V.  Bibliographical  Notes  on  the  Myths  and  Religions  of  America 429 

VI.  Archaeological  Museums  and  Periodicals 437 

Illustrations:  Mexican  Clay  Mask,  419;  Quetzalcoatl,  432 ; The  Mexican  Temple,  433; 

The  Temple  of  Mexico,  434 ; Teoyaomiqui,  435  ; Ancient  Teocalli,  Oaxaca,  Mexico,  436. 

Index 445 


INTRODUCTION. 


By  the  Editor. 


Part  I.  AMERICANA  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


HARRISSE,  in  the  Introduction  of  his  Bibli- 
otheca Americana  Vetustissima,  enumerates 
and  characterizes  many  of  the  bibliographies  of 
Americana,  beginning  with  the  chapter,  “ De 
Scriptoribus  rerum  Americanarum,”  in  the  Bib- 
liotheca Classica  of  Draudius,  in  1622.1  De  Laet, 
in  his  Nieuwe  Wereldt  (1625),  gives  a list  of 
about  thirty-seven  authorities,  which  he  in- 
creased somewhat  in  later  editions.2 *  The  earli- 
est American  catalogue  of  any  moment,  however, 
came  from  a native  Peruvian,  Leon  y Pinelo, 
who  is  usually  cited  by  the  latter  name  only. 
He  had  prepared  an  extensive  list ; but  he 
published  at  Madrid,  in  1629,  a selection  of 
titles  only,  under  the  designation  of  Epitome 
de  la  biblioteca  oriental  i occidental ,8  which  in- 
cluded manuscripts  as  well  as  books.  He  had 
exceptional  advantages  as  chronicler  of  the 
Indies. 

In  1671,  in  Montanus’s  Nieuwe  weereld,  and 
in  Ogilby’s  America,  about  167  authorities  are 
enumerated. 

Sabin 4 refers  to  Cornelius  van  Beughem’s 
Bibliographia  Historica,  1685,  published  at  Am- 
sterdam, as  having  the  titles  of  books  on  America. 


The  earliest  exclusively  American  catalogue 
is  the  Bibliotheca  Americana:  Primordia  of  White 
Kennett,5  Bishop  of  Peterborough,  published  in 
London  in  1713.  The  arrangement  of  its  sixteen 
hundred  entries  is  chronological ; and  it  enters 
under  their  respective  dates  the  sections  of  such 
collections  as  Hakluyt  and  Ramusio.6  It  par- 
ticularly pertains  to  the  English  colonies,  and 
more  especially  to  New  England,  where,  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  three  distinctively  valuable 
American  libraries  are  known  to  have  existed, 
— that  of  the  Mather  family,  which  was  in  large 
part  destroyed  during  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill, 
in  1775;  that  °f  Thomas  Prince,  still  in  large 
part  existing  in  the  Boston  Public  Library;  and 
that  of  Governor  Hutchinson,  scattered  by  the 
mob  which  attacked  his  house  in  Boston  in 
176s.7 

In  1716  Lenglet  du  Fresnoy  inserted  a brief 
list  (sixty  titles)  in  his  Methode  pour  etudier  la 
giographie.  Garcia’s  Origen  de  los  Indias  de  el 
nitevo  mundo,  Madrid,  1729,  shows  a list  of  about 
seventeen  hundred  authors.8 

In  1737-1738  Barcia  enlarged  Pinelo’s  work, 
translating  all  his  titles  into  Spanish,  and  added 


1 Herrera  failed  to  add  a»list  of  authors  to  the  original  edition  of  his  Historia  (1601-1615),  but  one  of  about 
thirty-three  entries  is  found  in  later  editions. 

2 See  Vol.  IV.  p.  417. 

8 Sabin,  vol.  x.  no.  40,053;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  no.  347;  Rich  (1832),  no.  iSS ; Triibner,  Bibliograph- 
ical Guide  to  American  Literature,  p.  viii;  Murphy,  no.  1,471. 

4 Dictionary,  vol.  ii.  no.  5,102. 

6  For  an  account  of  a likeness,  see  J.  C.  Smith’s  British  Mezzotint  Portraits , iv.  no.  1,694. 

6 The  book,  of  which  250  copies  only  were  printed,  is  rare,  and  Quaritch  prices  it  at  £3  (Sabin,  vol.  ix.  no. 
37>447)-  R preserves  some  titles  which  are  not  otherwise  known ; and  represents  a library  which  Kennett  had 
gathered  for  presentation  to  the  Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gospel  in  Foreign  Parts.  Rich  (Bib/. 
Amcr.  nova,  i.  21)  says  the  index  was  made  by  Robert  Watts.  Although  Stevens  (Historical  Collections, 
i.  142)  says  that  the  books  were  dispersed,  the  library  is  still  in  existence  in  London,  though  it  lacks  many 
titles  given  in  the  printed  catalogue,  and  shows  others  not  in  that  volume.  Cf.  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  xx. 
274;  Allibone,  ii.  1020;  James  Jackson’s  Bibliographies  geographiques  (Paris,  1881),  no.  606;  Triibner’s 
Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  ix ; Sabin,  Bibliography  of  Bibliographies , p.  lxxxvii. 

7 Memorial  History  of  Boston,  vol.  i.  pp.  xviii,  xix ; vol.  ii.  pp.  221,  426. 

8 The  original  edition  was  Valencia,  1607.  Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  no.  52. 

VOL.  I.  — a 


n 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


numerous  other  entries  which  Rich  1 says  were 
“ clumsily  thrown  together.” 

Charlevoix  prefixed  to  his  Nouvelle  France, 
in  1744,  a list  with  useful  comments,  which  the 
English  reader  can  readily  approach  in  Dr. 
Shea’s  translation.  A price-list  which  has  been 
preserved  of  the  sale  in  Paris  in  1764,  Catalogue 
des  livres  des  ci-devant  soi-disans  Jesuites  du  College 
de  Clermont,  indicates  tne  lack  of  competition  at 
that  time  for  those  choicer  Americana,  now  so 
costly.2  The  Regio  patronatu  Indiarum  of  Fras- 
sus  (1775)  gives  about  1505  authorities.  There 
is  a chronological  catalogue  of  books  issued  in 
the  American  colonies  previous  to  1775,  pre- 
pared by  S.  F.  Haven,  Jr.,  and  appended  to  the 
edition  of  Thomas’s  History  of  Printing,  pub- 
lished by  the  American  Antiquarian  Society. 
Though  by  no  means  perfect,  it  is  a convenient 
key  to  most  publications  illustrative  of  American 
history  during  the  colonial  period  of  the  Eng- 
lish possessions,  and  printed  in  America.  Dr. 
Robertson’s  America  (1777)  shows  only  250 
works,  and  it  indicates  how  far  short  he  was  of 
the  present  advantages  in  the  study  of  this  sub- 
ject. Clavigero  surpassed  all  his  predecessors 
in  the  lists  accompanying  his  Storia  del  Messico, 
published  in  1780,  — but  the  special  bibliography 
of  Mexico  is  examined  elsewhere.  Equally  spe- 
cial, and  confined  to  the  English  colonies,  is  the 
documentary  register  which  Jefferson  inserted 
in  his  Notes  on  Virginia  ; but  it  serves  to  show 
how  scanty  the  records  were  a hundred  years  ago 
compared  with  the  calendars  of  such  material 
now.  Meuzel,  in  1782,  had  published  enough  of 
his  Bibliotheca  Historica  to  cover  the  American 
field,  though  he  never  completed  the  work  as 
planned. 

In  1789  an  anonymous  Bibliotheca  Americana 
of  nearly  sixteen  hundred  entries  was  published 
in  London.  It  is  not  of  much  value.  Harrisse 
and  others  attribute  it  to  Reid  ; but  by  some  the 
author’s  name  is  differently  given  as  Homer, 
Dalrymple,  and  Long.3 

An  enumeration  of  the  documentary  sources 
(about  152  entries)  used  by  Munoz  in  his  Historia 
del  nuevo  mundo  (1793)  is  given  in  Fuster’s  Bibli- 


oteca  Valeticiana  (ii.  202-234)  published  at  Va- 
lencia in  1827-1830.4 

There  is  in  the  Library  of  Congress  (Force 
Collection)  a copy  of  an  Indice  de  la  Colecciqn  de 
manuscritos  pertinecientes  a la  historia  de  las  In- 
dias,  by  Fraggia,  Abella,  and  others,  dated  at 
Madrid,  1799.5 6 

In  the  Sparks  collection  at  Cornell  are  two 
other  manuscript  bibliographies  worthy  of  no- 
tice. One  is  a Biblioteca  Americana,  by  Antonio 
de  Alcedo,  dated  in  1807.  Sparks  says  his  copy 
was  made  in  1843  from  an  original  which  Oba- 
diah  Rich  had  found  in  Madrid.® 

Harrisse  says  that  another  copy  is  in  the 
Carter-Brown  Library;  and  he  asserts  that,  ex- 
cepting some  additions  of  modern  American 
authors,  it  is  not  much  improved  over  Barcia’s 
edition  of  Pinelo.  H.  H.  Bancroft7  mentions 
having  a third  copy,  which  had  formerly  belonged 
to  Prescott. 

The  other  manuscript  at  Cornell  is  a Bibli- 
otheca Americana,  prepared  in  twelve  volumes 
by  Arthur  Homer,  who  had  intended,  but  never 
accomplished,  the  publication  of  it.  Sparks 
found  it  in  Sir  Thomas  Phillipps’s  library  at 
Middlehill,  and  caused  the  copy  of  it  to  be 
made,  which  is  now  at  Ithaca.8 

In  1808  Boucher  de  la  Richarderie  pub- 
lished at  Paris  his  Bibliothique  universelle 
des  voyages ,9  which  has  in  the  fifth  part  a 
critical  list  of  all  voyages  to  American  wa- 
ters. Harrisse  disagrees  with  Peignot  in  his 
favorable  estimate  of  Richarderie,  and  traces 
to  him  the  errors  of  Faribault  and  later 
bibliographers. 

The  Bibliotheca  Hispano-A mericana  of  Dr. 
Jose  Mariano  Beristain  de  Souza  was  pub- 
lished in  Mexico  in  1816-1821,  in  three  vol- 
umes. Quaritch,  pricing  it  at  £96  in  1880, 
calls  it  the  rarest  and  most  valuable  of  all 
American  bibliographical  works.  It  is  a notice 
of  writers  who  were  born,  educated,  or  flourished 
in  Spanish  America,  and  naturally  covers  much 
of  interest  to  the  historical  student.  The  author 
did  not  live  to  complete  it,  and  his  nephew 
finished  it. 


1 Catalogue  (1832),  no.  188.  Cf.  Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  568;  Trtibner,  Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  ix; 
Sabin,  vol.  i.  no.  3,349.  The  portion  on  America  is  in  vol.  ii. 

2 For  example,  the  Champlain  of  1613,  3 fr. ; that  of  1632,  4 fr. ; 21  volumes  of  the  Relations  of  the 
Jesuits,  18  fr. 

3 Sabin,  Dictionary,  vol.  ii.  no.  5.198  ; and  Bibliography  of  Bibliographies,  p.  xviii ; Hist.  Mag.,  i.  57 ; and 

Allibone,  ii.  1 764,  who  calls  him  Reid,  an  American  resident  in  London,  and  says  he  issued  the  bibliography 
as  preparatory  to  a history  of  America.  Jackson’s  Bibliographies  geographiques,  no.  611,  and  Triibner, 
Bibliographical  Guide , p x,  call  it  by  the  name  of  the  publisher,  Debrett. 

* Jackson’s  Bibliographies  geographiques,  no  621. 

6 Jackson,  Bibliographies  geographiques,  no.  612;  Serapeum  (1845),  P-  223;  Triibner,  Bibliographical 
Guide,  p.  xxv 

6 Sparks,  Catalogue , no.  1,635  ! Jackson’s  Bibliographies  geographiques,  no.  613  ; Triibner,  p.  xxv. 

7 History  of  Mexico,  iii.  512,  where  is  an  account  of  Alcedo’s  historical  labors. 

3 Sparks,  Catalogue,  no.  1,635  a,  and  p.  230. 

9 Sabin,  Bibliography  of  Bibliographies,  p.  xxiv;  H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  700,  760. 


AMERICANA,  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


iii 


In  1818  Colonel  Israel  Thorndike,  of  Boston, 
bought  for  $6,500  the  American  library  of  Pro- 
fessor Ebeling,  of  Germany,  estimated  to  contain 
over  thirty-two  hundred  volumes,  besides 
an  extraordinary  collection  of  ten  thousand 
maps.1  The  library  was  given  by  the  pur- 
chaser to  Harvard  College,  and  its  posses- 
sion at  once  put  the  library  of  that  insti- 
tution at  the  head  of  all  libraries  in  the 
United  States  for  the  illustration  of  Amer- 
ican history.  No  catalogue  of  it  was  ever 
printed,  except  as  a part  of  the  General 
Catalogue  of  the  College  Library  issued 
in  1830-1834,  in  five  volumes. 

Another  useful  collection  of  Americana 
added  to  the  same  library  was  that  formed 
by  David  B.  Warden,  for  forty  years 
United  States  Consul  at  Paris,  who  printed 
a catalogue  of  its  twelve  hundred  volumes 
at  Paris,  in  1820,  called  Bibliotheca  Americo- 
Septentrionalis.  The  collection  in  1823 
found  a purchaser  at  $5,000,  in  Mr.  Samuel 
A.  Eliot,  who  gave  it  to  the  College.2 

The  Harvard  library,  however,  as  well 
as  several  of  the  best  collections  of  Amer- 
icana in  the  United  States,  owes  more, 
perhaps,  to  Obadiah  Rich  than  to  any 
other.  This  gentleman,  a native  of  Boston, 
was  born  in  1783.  He  went  as  consul  of 
the  United  States  to  Valencia  in  1815,  and 
there  began  his  study  of  early  Spanish- 
American  history,  and  undertook  the  gath- 
ering of  a remarkable  collection  of  books,3  which 
he  threw  open  generously,  with  his  own  kindly 
assistance,  to  every  investigator  who  visited 
Spain  for  purposes  of  study.  Here  he  won  the 


respect  of  Alexander  H.  Everett,  then  American 
minister  to  the  court  of  Spain.  He  captivated 
Irving  by  his  helpful  nature,  who  says  of  him : 


EBELING.4 


“ Rich  was  one  of  the  most  indefatigable,  intelli- 
gent, and  successful  bibliographers  in  Europe. 
His  house  at  Madrid  was  a literary  wilderness, 
abounding  with  curious  works  and  rare  editions. 


1 Quincy’s  Harvard  University,  ii.  413,  596.  It  is  noteworthy,  in  view  of  so  rich  an  accession  coming 
from  Gennany,  that  Grahame,  the  historian  of  our  colonial  period,  says  that  in  1825  he  found  the  University 
Library  at  Gottingen  richer  in  books  for  his  purpose  than  all  the  libraries  of  Britain  joined  together. 

2 This  collection  is  also  embraced  in  the  Catalogue  of  the  College  Library  already  referred  to.  Mr.  Warden 
began  the  collection  of  another  library,  which  he  used  while  writing  the  American  part  (10  vols.)  of  the  Art  de 
verifier  dcs  Dates,  Paris,  1826-1844,  and  which  (1,1 1 8 works)  was  afterward  sold  to  the  State  Library  at  Albany 
for  $4,000.  Dr.  Henry  A.  Homes,  the  librarian  at  Albany,  informs  me  that  when  arranged  it  made  twenty-one 
hundred  and  twenty-three  volumes.  Warden’s  Bibliotheca  Americana,  Paris,  1831,  reprinted  at  Paris  in  1S40, 
is  a catalogue  of  this  collection.  Mr.  Warden  died  in  1845,  aged  67.  Cf.  Ludewig  in  the  Scrapeum.  1845,  p. 
209;  Muller,  Books  on  America  (1S72),  no.  1734;  Allibone,  iii.  2,579;  S.  G.  Goodrich,  Recollections,  ii.  243; 
Jackson’s  Bibl,  Gcog.,  nos.  617,  61S  ; Triibner,  Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  xiv.  There  was  a final  sale  of  Mr, 
Warden’s  books  by  Horatio  Hill,  in  New  York,  in  1S46. 

3 This  collection  was  offered  to  Congress  for  purchase  through  Edward  Everett  in  December,  1S27.  The 
printed  list,  with  nearly  a hundred  entries  for  manuscripts  and  three  hundred  and  eighty-nine  for  printed  books, 
covering  the  years  1506-1825,  was  printed  as  Document  37  of  the  1st  session  of  the  20th  Congress.  The  sale 
was  not  effected.  Rich  had  been  able  to  gather  the  books  at  moderate  cost  because  of  the  troubled  political 
state  of  the  peninsula.  Triibner,  Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  xv. 

•4  This  portrait  of  one  of  the  earliest  contributors  to  the  bibliography  of  American  history  follows  an  en- 
graving in  the  Allgemcinc  geographischc  Ephcmeridcn,  May,  1S00,  p.  395.  Ebeling  was  born  Nov.  20,  1741, 
and  died  June  30,  1S17,  and  his  own  contributions  to  American  History  were  — 

(a)  Amerikanische  Bibliothck  (Zwei  Stiicke),  Leipzig,  1777. 

( b ) Erdbcscrcibung  und  Geschichte  von  America,  Hamburg,  1795-1S16,  in  seven  vols. ; the  author’s  inter- 
leaved copy,  with  manuscript  notes,  is  in  Harvard  College  Library. 

(c)  With  Professor  Hegewisch,  Amcrieanisches  Magazin,  Hamburg,  1797. 

There  are  other  likenesses,  — one  a large  lithograph  published  at  Hamburgh;  the  other  a small  profile  by 
C.  H.  Kniep.  Both  are  in  the  collection  of  the  American  Antiquarian  Society. 


IV 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


. . . He  was  withal  a man  of  great  truthfulness 
and  simplicity  of  character,  of  an  amiable  and 
obliging  disposition  and  strict  integrity.”  Sim- 
ilar was  the  estimation  in  which  he  was  held  by 
Ticknor,  Prescott,  George  Bancroft,  and  many 
others,  as  Allibone  has  recorded.1  In  1828  he  re- 
moved to  London,  where  he  established  himself 
as  a bookseller.  From  this  period,  as  Harrisse  2 
fitly  says,  it  was  under  his  influence,  acting  upon 
the  lovers  of  books  among  his  compatriots,  that 
the  passion  for  forming  collections  of  books  ex- 
clusively American  grew  up.3  In  those  days  the 
cost  of  books  now  esteemed  rare  was  trifling 
compared  with  the  prices  demanded  at  present. 
Rich  had  a prescience  in  his  calling,  and  the 
beginnings  of  the  great  libraries  of  Colonel 
Aspinwall,  Peter  Force,  James  Lenox,  and  John 
Carter  Brown  were  made  under  his  fostering 
eye ; which  was  just  as  kindly  vigilant  for  Gren- 
ville, who  was  then  forming  out  of  the  income 
of  his  sinecure  office  the  great  collection  which 
he  gave  to  the  British  nation  in  recompense  for 
his  support.4 5  In  London,  watching  the  book- 
markets  and  making  his  catalogue,  Rich  con- 
tinued to  live  for  the  rest  of  his  life  (he  died  in 
February,  1850),  except  for  a period  when  he 
was  the  United  States  consul  at  Port  Mahon  in 
the  Balearic  Islands.  His  bibliographies  are  still 
valuable,  his  annotations  in  them  are  trustworthy, 
and  their  records  are  the  starting-points  of  the 
growth  of  prices.  His  issues  and  reissues  of 
them  are  somewhat  complicated  by  supplements 
and  combinations,  but  collectors  and  bibliog- 
raphers place  them  on  their  shelves  in  the 
following  order : 

I.  A Catalogue  of  books  relating  principally  to  A mer- 
ica , arranged  wider  the  years  in  which  they  were  printed 
(1500-1700),  London,  1832.  This  included  four  hundred 
and  eighty-six  numbers,  those  designated  by  a star  without 
price  being  understood  to  be  in  Colonel  Aspinwall’s  col- 
lection. Two  small  supplements  were  added  to  this. 


2.  Bibliotheca  Americana  Nova , printed  since  1700 
(to  1800),  London,  1835.  Two  hundred  and  fifty  copies 
were  printed.  A supplement  appeared  in  1841,  and  this 
became  again  a part  of  his 

3.  Bibliotheca  Americarta  Nova , vol.  i.  (1701-1800); 
vol.  li.  (1801-1844),  whicn  was  printed  (250  copies)  in  Lon- 
don in  1846. 6 

It  was  in  1833  that  Colonel  Thomas  Aspin- 
wall, of  Boston,  who  was  for  thirty-eight  years 
the  American  consul  at  London,  printed  at  Paris 
a catalogue  of  his  collection  of  Americana, 
where  seven  hundred  and  seventy-one  lots  in 
eluded,  beside  much  that  was  ordinarily  usefu., 
a great  number  of  the  rarest  of  books  on  Ameri- 
can history.  Harrisse  has  called  Colonel  Aspin- 
wall, not  without  justice,  “a  bibliophile  of  great 
tact  and  activity.”  All  but  the  rarest  part  of 
his  collection  was  subsequently  burned  in  1863, 
when  it  had  passed  into  the  hands  of  Mr.  Sam- 
uel L.  M.  Barlow,6  of  New  York. 

M.  Ternaux-Compans,  who  had  collected  — 
as  Mr.  Brevoort  thinks  7 — the  most  extensive 
library  of  books  on  America  ever  brought  to- 
gether, printed  his  Bibliothique  Americaine 8 * * * * * in 
1837  at  Paris.  It  embraced  1,154  works,  arranged 
chronologically,  and  all  of  them  of  a date  before 
1700.  The  titles  were  abridged,  and  accom- 
panied by  French  translations.  His  annota- 
tions were  scant ; and  other  students  besides  Rich 
have  regretted  that  so  learned  a man  had  not 
more  benefited  his  fellow-students  by  ampler 
notes.6 

Also  in  1837  appeared  the  Catalogue  d'ou - 
wages  stir  I’histoire  de  l' Amerique,  of  G.  B.  Fari- 
bault, which  was  published  at  Quebec,  and  was 
more  specially  devoted  to  books  on  New 
France.16 

With  the  works  of  Rich  and  Ternaux  the 
bibliography  of  Americana  may  be  considered 
to  have  acquired  a distinct  recognition ; and 
the  succeeding  survey  of  this  field  may  be 


1 Dictionary , ii.  1788. 

2 Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  p.  xxix. 

3 Dibdin  ( Library  Companion , edition  1825,  p.  467)  refers  to  this  spirit,  hoping  it  would  lead  to  a new 
edition  of  White  Kennett,  perfected  to  date.  • 

4 Bibliotheca  Grenvilliana  (London,  1S42),  now  a part  of  the  British  Museum. 

5 Sabin,  Bibliog.  of  Bibliog.,  p.  exxi ; Allibone,  Dictionary , p.  17S7;  Triibner,  Bibliographical  Guide  to 
American  Literature,  Introduction,  p.  xiv ; Jackson’s  Bibl.  Gcog.,  no.  623,  etc.;  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc., 
i.  395;  Historical  Magazine,  iii.  75;  Menzies  Catalogue,  no.  1,690;  Ternaux-Compans,  Bibliothique  Amcri- 
caine,  Preface.  Puttick  and  Simpson’s  Catalogues,  London,  June  25,  1S50,  and  March,  April,  and  May, 
1872,  note  some  of  his  books,  besides  manuscript  bibliographies. 

After  Mr.  Rich’s  death  Mr.  Edward  G.  Allen  took  the  business,  and  issued  various  catalogues  of  books 
on  America  in  1857-1871.  Cf.  Jackson’s  Bibliog.  Gcog.,  nos.  677-682. 

6 See  Vol.  III.  p.  159.  The  catalogue,  being  without  date,  is  sometimes  given  later  than  1833.  Cf.  JacK- 
son,  Bibliog.  Gcog.,  no.  636  ; and  no.  690.  A new  Rough  List  of  the  Barlow  Collection  was  printed  in  1885. 

7 Magazine  of  American  History,  iii.  177.  This  library  was  sold  in  November,  1836,  as  Raetzel’s ; the 

numbers  908-2,117  concerned  America.  Triibner  ( Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  xviii)  says  the  collection  was 

formed  by  Ternaux  probably  with  an  ultimate  view  to  sale.  Ternaux  did  not  die  till  December,  1S64. 

3 Now  worth  40  or  50  francs. 

6 Triibner,  Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  xvi. 

16  See  Vol.  IV.  p.  367.  Cf.  also  Triibner,  Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  xviii;  and  Daniel’s  Nos  Gloirei 

Nalionalcs,  where  will  be  found  a portrait  of  Faribault. 


AMERICANA,  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


V 


more  conveniently  made  if  we  group  the  con- 
tributors by  some  broad  discriminations  of  the 
motives  influencing  them,  though  such  distinc- 
tions sometimes  become  confluent. 

First,  as  regards  what  may  be  termed  pro- 
fessional bibliography.  One  of  the  earliest 
workers  in  the  new  spirit  was  a Dresden  jurist, 
Hermann  E.  Ludewig,  who  came  to  the  United 
States  in  1844,  and  prepared  an  account  of  the 
Literature  of  American  local  history , which  was 
published  in  1846.  This  was  followed  by  a 
supplement,  pertaining  wholly  to  New  York 
State,  which  appeared  in  The  Literary  World, 
February  19,  1848.  He  had  previously  pub- 
lished in  the  Serapeum  at  Leipsic  ( 1845,  pp.  209) 
accounts  of  American  libraries  and  bibliogra- 
phy, which  were  the  first  contributions  to  this 
subject.1  Some  years  later,  in  1858,  there  was 
published  in  London  a monograph  on  The  Lit- 
erature of  the  American  Aboriginal  Linguistics ,2 
which  had  been  undertaken  by  Mr.  Ludewig 
but  had  not  been  carried  through  the  press, 
when  he  died,  Dec.  12,  1856.3 

We  owe  to  a Franco-American  citizen  the 
most  important  bibliography  which  we  have 
respecting  the  first  half  century  of  American 
history;  for  the  Bibliotheca  Americana  Vetus- 
tissima  only  comes  down  to  1551  in  its  chrono- 
logical arrangement.  Mr.  Brevoort 4 * very 
properly  characterizes  it  as  “a  work  which 
lightens  the  labors  of  such  as  have  to  investi- 
gate early  American  history.”  6 

It  was  under  the  hospitable  roof  of  Mr.  Bar- 
low’s library  in  New  York  that,  “having  gloated 
for  years  over  second-hand  compilations,”  Har- 
risse  says  that  he  found  himself  “for  the  first 
time  within  reach  of  the  fountain-heads  of  his- 
tory.” Here  he  gathered  the  materials  for  his 
Notes  on  Columbus,  which  were,  as  he  says,  like 
“ pencil  marks  varnished  over.”  These  first 
appeared  less  perfectly  than  later,  in  the  New 
York  Commercial  Advertiser,  under  the  title  of 
“Columbus  in  a Nut-shell.”  Mr.  Harrisse  had 
also  prepared  (four  copies  only  printed)  for  Mr. 
Barlow  in  1864  the  Bibliotheca  Barlowiana, 
which  is  a descriptive  catalogue  of  the  rarest 
books  in  the  Barlow-Aspinwall  Collection,  touch- 
ing especially  the  books  on  Virginian  and  New 
England  history  between  1602  and  1680. 


Mr.  Barlow  now  (1864)  sumptuously  printed 
the  Notes  on  Columbus  in  a volume  (ninety-nine 
copies)  for  private  distribution.  For  some  rea- 
son not  apparent,  there  were  expressions  in  this 
admirable  treatise  which  offended  some ; as 
when,  for  instance  (p.  vii),  he  spoke  of  being 
debarred  the  privileges  of  a much-vaunted  pub- 
lic library,  referring  to  the  Astor  Library.  Simi- 
lar inadvertences  again  brought  him  hostile 
criticism,  when  two  years  later  (1866)  he  printed 
with  considerable  typographical  luxury  his 
Bibliotheca  Americana  Vetustissima,  which  was 
published  in  New  York.  It  embraces  some- 
thing over  three  hundred  entries.6  The  work 
is  not  without  errors ; and  Mr.  Henry  Stevens, 
who  claims  that  he  was  wrongly  accused  in  the 
book,  gave  it  a bad  name  in  the  London  Athe- 
nceum  of  Oct.  6,  1866,  where  an  unfortunate 
slip,  in  making  “ Ander  Schiff ahrt  ” 7 a person- 
age, is  unmercifully  ridiculed.  A committee  of 
the  Societe  de  Geographic  in  Paris,  of  which 
M.  Ernest  Desjardins  was  spokesman,  came  to 
the  rescue,  and  printed  a Rapport  sur  les  deux 
ouvrages  de  bibliographie  Americaine  de  M.  HeJiri 
Harrisse,  Paris,  1867.  In  this  document  the 
claim  is  unguardedly  made  that  Harrisse’s  book 
was  the  earliest  piece  of  solid  erudition  which 
America  had  produced,  — a phrase  qualified  later 
as  applying  to  works  of  American  bibliography 
only.  It  was  pointed  out  that  while  for  the 
period  of  1492-1551  Rich  had  given  twenty 
titles,  and  Ternaux  fifty-eight,  Harrisse  had 
enumerated  three  hundred  and  eight.8 

Harrisse  prepared,  while  shut  up  in  Paris 
during  the  siege  of  1870,  his  Notes  sur  la  Nou- 
velle  France,  a valuable  bibliographical  essay 
referred  to  elsewhere.9  He  later  put  in  shape 
the  material  which  he  had  gathered  for  a supple- 
mental volume  to  his  Bibliotheca  Americana 
Vetustissima,  which  he  called  Additions ,ln  and 
published  it  in  Paris  in  1872.  In  his  intro- 
duction to  this  latter  volume  he  shows  how 
thoroughly  he  has  searched  the  libraries  of 
Europe  for  new  evidences  of  interest  in  America 
during  the  first  half  century  after  its  discovery. 
He  notes  the  depredations  upon  the  older 
libraries  which  have  been  made  in  recent  years, 
since  the  prices  for  rare  Americana  have  ruled 
so  high.  He  finds11  that  the  Biblioteca  Colom- 


1 Sabin,  x.  nos.  42,644-42,645. 

2 Sabin,  x.  42,643  ; Trubner,  Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  xxi. 

8 Historical  Magazine,  xii.  145  ; Allibone,  ii.  p.  1142.  The  sale  of  Mr.  Ludewig’s  library  (i,3So  entries) 
took  place  in  New  York  in  1858. 

4 In  his  Verrazano,  p.  5. 

* Cf.  also  D’Avezac  in  his  Waltzcmiiller,  p.  4. 

6 Sabin,  viii.  p.  107  ; Jackson,  Bibliog.  Gcog.,  no.  696.  The  edition  was  four  hundred  copies. 

7 An  error  traced  to  the  proof-reader,  it  is  said  in  Sabin’s  Bibliog.  of  Bibliog.,  p.  lxxiv. 

8 Stevens  noticed  this  defence  by  reiterating  his  charges  in  a note  in  his  Bibliotheca  Historica,  1870, 

no.  860. 

' 9 Vol.  IV.  p.  366.  10  Sabin,  Bibliography  of  Bibliographies,  p.  lxxv. 

11  Grandeur  ct  decadence  de  la  Colovtbinc . Paris,  iSS;. 


VI 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


bina  at  Seville,  as  compared  with  a catalogue  of 
it  made  by  Ferdinand  Columbus  himself,  has 
suffered  immense  losses.  “ It  is  curious  to  no- 
tice,” he  finally  says,  “ how  few  of  the  original 
books  relating  to  the  early  history  of  the  New 
World  can  be  found  in  the  public  libraries  of 
Europe.  There  is  not  a literary  institution, 
however  rich  and  ancient,  which  in  this  respect 
could  compare  with  three  or  four  private 
libraries  in  America.  The  Marciana  at  Venice 
is  probably  the  richest.  The  Trivulgiana  at 
Milan  can  boast  of  several  great  rarities.” 

For  the  third  contributor  to  the  recent  bibli- 
ography of  Americana,  we  must  still  turn  to  an 
adopted  citizen,  Joseph  Sabin,  an  Englishman 
by  birth.  Various  publishing  enterprises  of 
interest  to  the  historical  student  are  associated 
with  Mr.  Sabin’s  name.  He  published  a quarto 
series  of  reprints  of  early  American  tracts, 
eleven  in  number,  and  an  octavo  series,  seven 
in  number.1  He  published  for  several  years, 
beginning  in  1869,  the  American  Bibliopolist , a 
record  of  new  books,  with  literary  miscellanies, 
largely  upon  Americana.  In  1867  he  began  the 
publication  (five  hundred  copies)  of  the  most 
extensive  American  bibliography  yet  made,  A 
Dictionary  of  books  relating  to  America , from  its 
discovery  to  the  present  time.  The  author’s  death, 
in  1881, 2 left  the  work  somewhat  more  than  half 
done,  and  it  has  been  continued  since  his  death 
by  his  sons.3 

In  the  Notas  para  una  bibliografa  de  obras 
anonimas  i seudonimas  of  Diego  Barros  Arana, 
published  at  Santiago  de  Chile  in  1882,  five  hun- 
dred and  seven  books  on  America  (1493-1876), 
without  authors,  are  traced  to  their  writers. 

As  a second  class  of  contributors  to  the 
bibliographical  records  of  America,  we  must 


reckon  the  students  who  have  gathered  libraries 
for  use  in  pursuing  their  historical  studies. 
Foremost  among  such,  and  entitled  to  be 
esteemed  a pioneer  in  the  modern  spirit  of 
research,  is  Alexander  von  Humboldt.  * He 
published  his  Examen  critique  de  I'histoire  de  la 
geographie  du  nouveau  continent ,4  in  five  volumes, 
between  1836  and  1839.5  “ It  is,”  says  Brevoort,6 
“ a guide  which  all  must  consult.  With  a master 
hand  the  author  combines  and  collates  all 
attainable  materials,  and  draws  light  from 
sources  which  he  first  brings  to  bear  in  his 
exhaustive  investigations.”  Harrisse  calls  it 
“ the  greatest  monument  ever  erected  to  the 
early  history  of  this  continent.” 

Humboldt’s  library  was  bought  by  Henry 
Stevens,  who  printed  in  1863,  in  London,  a 
catalogue  of  it,  showing  11,164  entries;  but  this 
was  not  published  till  1870.  It  included  a set 
of  the  Examen  critique,  with  corrections,  and  the 
notes  for  a new  sixth  volume.7  Harrisse,  who 
it  is  believed  contemplated  at  one  time  a new 
edition  of  this  book,  alleges  that  through  the 
remissness  of  the  purchaser  of  the  library  the 
world  has  lost  sight  of  these  precious  memorials 
of  Humboldt’s  unperfected  labors.  Stevens,  in 
the  London  Atheiueum,  October,  1866,  rebuts  the 
charge.8 

Of  the  collection  of  books  and  manuscripts 
formed  by  Col.  Peter  Force  we  have  no  sepa- 
rate record,  apart  from  their  making  a por- 
tion of  the  general  catalogue  of  the  Library 
of  Congress,  the  Government  having  bought 
the  collection  in  1867.9 

The  library  which  Jared  Sparks  formed 
during  the  progress  of  his  historical  labors  was 
sold  about  1872  to  Cornell  University,  and  is 
now  at  Ithaca.  Mr.  Sparks  left  behind  him 
“ imperfect  but  not  unfaithful  lists  of  his  books,” 


1 7-7 ■ Cooke  Catalogue , no.  2,214;  Griswold  Catalogue , nos.  730,  731.  The  editions  were  fifty  copies 
on  large  paper,  two  hundred  on  small.  It  may  be  worth  record  that  Gowan,  a publisher  in  New  Vork,  was 
the  earliest  (1846)  to  instigate  a taste  for  large  paper  copies  among  American  collectors,  by  printing  in  that 
style  Furman’s  edition  of  Denton’s  Description  of  New  York,  after  the  manner  of  the  English  purveyors  to 
book-fancying. 

2 See  Proceedings  of  the  Numismatic  and  Antiquarian  Society,  Philadelphia,  18S1,  p.  28. 

3 Mr.  Wilberforce  Eames  is  the  new  editor.  A list  of  the  catalogues  prepared  by  Mr.  Sabin  is  given  in  his 

Bibliography  of  Bibliographies,  p.  cxxiv,  etc. 

4 The  German  translation,  Kritische  Untersuchungen , was  made  by  J.  I.  Ideler,  Berlin,  1852,  in  3 vols. 
It  has  an  index,  which  the  French  edition  lacks. 

5 Sabin,,  viii.  539.  The  edition  of  Paris,  without  date,  called  Histoire  de  la  geographie  du  nouveau 
continent,  is  the  same,  with  a new  title  and  an  introduction  of  four  pages,  La  Cosa’s  map  being  omitted. 

6 Verrazano,  p.  4. 

7 In  his  Cosmos  Humboldt  gives  results,  which  he  says  are  reached  in  his  unpublished  sixth  volume  of  the 

Examen  critique. 

■ 8 The  Humboldt  Library  was  burned  in  London  in  June,  1S65.  Nearly  all  of  the  catalogues  were  destroyed 
at  the  same  time ; but  a few  large  paper  copies  were  saved,  which,  being  perfected  with  a sew  title  (London, 
1878),  have  since  been  offered  by  Stevens  for  sale.  Portions  of  the  introduction  to  it  are  also  used  in  an  article 
by  Stevens  on  Humboldt,  in  the  Jour/ial  of  Sciences  and  Arts  January,  1870.  Various  of  Humboldt’s 
manuscripts  on  Ame-ican  matters  are  advertised  in  Stargardt’s  Amerika  und  Orient,  no.  133,  p.  3 (Berlin, 
1881). 

9 Cf.  Historical  Magazine,  vol.  ix.  no.  335  ; Magazine  of  American  History,  vol.  ii.  pp.  193^  221,  565; 
Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  April,  :868.  Colonel  Force  died  in  January,  1868. 


AMERICANA,  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


VII 


which,  after  some  supervision  by  Dr.  Cogswell 
and  others,  were  put  in  shape  for  the  press  by 
Mr.  Charles  A.  Cutter  of  the  Boston  Athenaeum, 
and  were  printed,  in  1871,  as  Catalogue  of  the 
Library  of  Jared  Sparks.  In  the  appendix  was 
a list  of  the  historical  manuscripts,  originals  and 
copies,  which  are  now  on  deposit  in  Harvard 
College  Library.1 


In  1849  Mr.  H.  R.  Schoolcraft2  printed,  at 
the  expense  of  the  United  States  Government, 
a Bibliographical  Catalogue  of  books , etc.,  in  the 
Indian  tongues  of  the  United  States,  — a list  later 
reprinted  with  additions  in  his  Indian  Tribes  (in 
1851),  vol.  iv.3 

In  1861  Mr.  Ephraim  George  Squier  pub- 
lished at  New  York  a monograph  on  authors 


1 Mr.  Sparks  died  March  14,  1866.  Tributes  were  paid  to  his  memory  by  distinguished  associates  in  the 
Massachusetts  Historical  Society  ( Proceedings , ix.  157),  and  Dr.  George  E.  Ellis  reported  to  them  a full  and 
appreciative  memoir  ( Proceedings , x.  21 1).  Cf.  also  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  March,  1866;  Historical 
Magazine,  May,  1866  ; Brantz  Mayer  before  the  Maryland  Historical  Society,  1867,  etc. 

2 Cf.  Historical  Magazine,  vol.  ix.  p.  137. 

8 The  principal  interpreter  of  the  Indian  languages  of  the  temperate  parts  of  North  America  has  been 
Dr.  J.  Hammond  Trumbull,  of  Hartford,  for  whose  labor  in  the  bibliography  of  the  subject  see  a chapter  in 
vol  i.  of  the  Memorial  History  of  Boston.  There  is  also  a collection  edited  by  him,  of  books  in  and  upon  the 
Indian  languages,  in  the  Brinley  Catalogue,  iii.  123-145.  He  gave  in  the  Proceedings  of  the  American 
Antiquarian  Society,  and  also  separately  in  1874,  a list  of  books  in  the  Indian  languages,  printed  at  Cambridge 
and  Boston,  1653-1721  (Field,  Indian  Bibliography,  no.  1,571).  Cf.  also  Ludewig’s  Literature  of  American 
Aboriginal  Languages,  mentioned  on  an  earlier  page.  It  was  edited  and  corrected  by  William  W.  Turner. 
(Cf.  Pinart-Brasseur  Catalogue,  no.  565  ; Field,  Indian  Bibliography,  no.  959). 

Icazbalceta  published  in  1866,  at  Mexico,  a list  of  the  writers  on  the  languages  of  America;  and  Romero 
made  a similar  enumeration  of  those  of  Mexico,  in  1862,  in  the  Bolctin  de  la  Sociedad  Mexicana  de  Geografia, 
vol.  viii.  Dr.  Daniel  G.  Brinton  haz  made  a good  introduction  to  the  literary  history  of  the  native  Americans 
in  his  Aboriginal  American  Authors,  published  by  him  at  Philadelphia  in  1883.  For  his  own  linguistic  con* 
tributions,  see  Field,  Indian  Bibliography,  no.  187,  etc.  One  of  the  earliest  enumerations  of  linguistic  titles 
can  be  picked  out  of  the  list  which  Boturini  Benaduci,  in  1746,  appended  to  his  Idea  de  una  nueva  historia 
general  de  la  America  septentrional. 

The  most  extensive  enumeration  of  the  literature  of  all  the  North  American  tongues  is  doubtless  to  be  the 
Bibliography  of  North  American  Linguistics,  which  is  preparing  by  Mr.  James  C.  Pilling  of  the  Bureau  of 
Ethnology  in  Washington,  and  which  will  be  published  in  due  time  by  that  bureau.  A preliminary  issue  (100 
copies)  for  corrections  is  called  Proof-sheets  of  a Bibliography  of  the  Indian  Languages  of  North  America 
(pp.  xl,  1135). 

The  Bibliotheca  Americana  of  Leclerc  (Paris,  1879)  affords  many  titles  to  which  a preliminary"  Table 
des  Divisions  ” affords  an  index,  and  most  of  them  are  grouped  under  the  heading  “ Linguistique,”  p.  537,  etc. 
The  third  volume  of  H.  H.  Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  particularly  in  its  notes,  is  a necessary  aid  in  this  study; 
and  a convenient  summary  of  the  whole  subject  will  be  found  in  chapter  x.  of  John  T.  Short’s  North  Americans 
of  Antiquity.  J.  C.  E.  Buschmann  has  been  an  ardent  laborer  in  this  field ; the  bibliographies  give  his  printed 
works  (Field’s  Indian  Bibliography,  p.  208,  etc.),  and  Stargardt’s  Catalogue  (no.  135,  p.  6)  shows  some  of 
his  manuscripts.  The  Comte  Hyacinthe  de  Charencey  has  for  some  years,  from  time  to  time,  printed  various 
minor  monographs  on  these  subjects  ; and  in  1SS3  he  collected  his  views  in  a volume  of  Melanges  de philologie 
et  de  paleographic  Amcricaines. 

The  Abbe  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  in  his  Bibliothique  Mexico-Guaicmalienne  (Leclerc,  nos.  81,  1,084), 
has  given  for  Central  America  a very  excellent  list  of  the  works  on  the  linguistics  of  the  natives,  which  are 
all  contained  also  in  the  Catalogue  of  the  Pinart-Brasseur  sale,  which  took  place  in  Paris  in  fanuary  and 
February,  1884.  Cf.  the  paper  on  Brasseur  by  Dr.  Brinton,  in  Lippincolt's  Magazine,  vol.  i. ; and  the 
enumeration  of  his  numerous  writings  in  Sabin’s  Dictionary,  ii.  7,420;  also  Leclerc,  Field,  and  Bancroft. 

Dr.  F clix  C.  Y.  Sobron’s  Los  Idiomas  de  la  America  Latina, — Estudios  Biografico-bibliograficos,  pub- 
lished a few  years  since  at  Madrid,  gives,  according  to  Dr.  Brinton,  extended  notices  of  several  rare  volumes ; 
but  on  the  whole  the  book  is  neither  exhaustive  nor  very  accurate. 

Julius  Platzmann's  Verzcichniss  eincr  Auswahl  Amerikanischcr  Grammatikcn,  etc.  (Leipsic,  1876),  is 
a small  but  excellent  list,  with  proper  notes.  These  bibliographies  will  show  the  now  numerous  works  upon 
the  aboriginal  tongues,  their  construction  and  their  fruits. 

There  are  several  important  series  interesting  to  the  student,  which  are  found  in  the  catalogues.  Such 
are  the  Bibliothique  linguistique  Americaine,  published  in  seven  volumes  by  Maisonneuve  in  Paris  (Le- 
clerc, no.  2,674)  t the  Co/eccion  de  linguistica  y etnografia  Americanos,  or  Bibliothique  de  linguistique  et 
d’ Ethnographic  Amcricaines,  1875,  etc.,  edited  by  A.  L.  Pinart ; the  Library  of  American  Linguistics,  in 
thirteen  volumes,  edited  by  Dr.  John  G.  Shea  (Cf.  Brinley  Catalogue,  vol.  iii.  no.  5,631  ; Field,  no.  1,396); 
Brinton' s Library  of  Aboriginal  American  Literature,  published  by  Dr.  D.  G.  Brinton  in  Philadelphia  ; and 
Brasseur  de  Bourbourg’s  Collection  de  documents  dans  les  langucs  indigincs,  Paris,  1S61-1S64,  in  four 
volumes  (cf.  Field,  p.  175). 

The  earliest  work  printed  exclusively  in  a native  language  was  the  Catecismo  de  la  Dodrina  Cristiana 
en  lengua  Timuiquana,  published  at  Mexico  in  1617  (cf.  Sabin,  vol.  xiv.  no.  58,580;  Finotti,  p.  14).  This  is 
the  statement  often  made ; but  Mr.  Pilling  refers  me  to  references  in  Icazbalceta’s  Zumdrraga  (vol.  i.  p.  290) 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


viii 


who  had  written  in  the  languages  of  Central 
America,  enumerating  one  hundred  and  ten,  with 
a list  of  the  books  and  manuscripts  on  the 
history,  the  aborigines,  and  the  antiquities  of 
Central  America,  borrowed  from  other  sources 
in  part.  At  the  sale  of  Mr.  Squier’s  library  in 
1876,  the  catalogue 1 of  which  was  made  by  Mr. 
Sabin,  the  entire  collection  of  his  manuscripts 
fell,  as  mentioned  elsewhere,'2  into  the  hands  of 
Mr.  Hubert  Howe  Bancroft  of  San  Francisco. 

Probably  the  largest  collection  of  books  and 
manuscripts 3 which  any  American  has  formed 
for  use  in  writing  is  that  which  belongs  to  Mr. 
Bancroft.  He  is  the  organizer  of  an  extensive 
series  of  books  on  the  antiquities  and  history 
of  the  Pacific  coast.  To  accomplish  an  examina- 
tion of  the  aboriginal  and  civilized  history  of 
so  large  a field 4 as  thoroughly  as  he  has  un- 
questionably made  it,  within  a lifetime,  was 
a bold  undertaking,  to  be  carried  out  in  a centre 
of  material  rather  than  of  literary  enterprise. 
The  task  involved  the  gathering  of  a library 
of  printed  books,  at  a distance  from  the  purely 
intellectual  activity  of  the  country,  and  where 
no  other  collection  of  moment  existed  to  supple- 
ment it.  It  required  the  seeking  and  making 
of  manuscripts,  from  the  labor  of  which  one 
might  well  shrink.  It  was  fortunate  that  during 
the  gathering  of  this  collection  some  notable  col- 
lections— like  those  of  Maximilian,5  Ramirez, 


and  Squier,  not  to  name  others  — were  oppor- 
tunely brought  to  the  hammer,  a chance  by 
which  Mr.  Bancroft  naturally  profited. 

Mr.  Bancroft  had  been  trained  in  the  busi- 
ness habits  of  the  book  trade,  in  which  he  had 
established  himself  in  San  Francisco  as  early  as 
1856.6  He  was  at  this  time  twenty-four  years 
old,  having  been  born  of  New  England  stock 
in  Ohio  in  1832,  and  having  had  already  four 
years  residence  — since  1852  — in  San  Francisco 
as  the  agent  of  an  eastern  bookseller.  It  was 
not  till  1869  that  he  set  seriously  to  work  on  his 
history,  and  organized  a staff  of  assistants.7 
They  indexed  his  library,  which  was  now  large 
( 12,000  volumes)  and  was  kept  on  an  upper  floor 
of  his  business  quarters,  and  they  classified  the 
references  in  paper  bags.8  His  first  idea  was  to 
make  an  encyclopaedia  of  the  antiquities  and  his- 
tory of  the  Pacific  Coast ; and  it  is  on  the  whole 
unfortunate  that  he  abandoned  the  scheme,  for 
his  methods  were  admirably  adapted  to  that  end, 
but  of  questionable  application  to  a sustained 
plan  of  historical  treatment.  It  is  the  encyclo- 
pedic quality  of  his  work,  as  the  user  eliminates 
what  he  wishes,  which  makes  and  will  continue 
to  make  the  books  that  pass  under  his  name  of 
the  first  importance  to  historical  students. 

In  1875  the  first  five  volumes  of  the  series, 
denominated  by  themselves  The  Native  Races  of 
the  Pacific  States,  made  their  appearance.  It  was 


to  an  earlier  edition  of  about  1547;  and  in  the  same  author’s  Bibliografia  Mexicana  (p.  32),  to  one  of  1553. 
Molina’s  Vocabulario  de  la  lengua  Castellana  y Mexicana , placing  the  Nahuatl  and  Castilian  in  connection, 
was  printed  at  Mexico  in  1555.  The  book  is  very  rare,  five  or  six  copies  only  being  known  ; and  Quaritch  has 
priced  an  imperfect  copy  at  £72  (Quaritch,  Bibliog.  Gcog.  linguistica,  1879,  no.  12,616;  Carter-Brown, 
vol.  i.  no.  206  ; Brinley  Catalogue,  vol.  iii.  no,  5,771k  The  edition  of  1571  is  also  rare  (Pinart-Brasscur  Cata- 
logue, no.  630;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  nos.  2S5,  286  ; Quaritch,  1879,  no.  12,617).  The  first  edition  of  Molina’s 
Aztec  grammar,  Arte  dc  la  lengua  Mexicana  y Castellana,  was  published  the  same  year  (1571).  Quaritch 
(1879,  no-  1 2,6 1 5 ) prices  this  at  £52  10 s.  Cf.  also  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  284.  One  of  the  chief  of  the 
more  recent  studies  of  the  linguistics  of  Mexico  is  Francisco  Pimentel’s  Cuadro  descriptivo  y comparative  de 
las  lenguas  indigenas  de  Mexico,  Mexico,  1S62-1865  ; and  second  edition  in  1874-1875. 

This  subject  has  other  treatment  later  in  the  present  volume. 

1 It  included  two  thousand  and  thirty-tour  items,  ninety-four  of  which  were  Mr.  Squier’s  own  works. 

2 Vol.  II.  p.  578. 

3 He  says  that  up  to  1881  he  had  gathered  35,000  volumes,  at  a cost  of  $300,000,  exclusive  of  time  and 
travelling  expenses.  His  manuscripts  embraced  1,200  volumes.  The  annual  growth  of  his  library  is  still 
1,000  volumes. 

4 One  twelfth  of  the  earth’s  surface,  as  he  says. 

5 Cf.  account  of  Maximilian’s  library  in  the  Bookworm  (1869),  p.  14. 

6 These  biographical  data  are  derived  from  a tract  given  out  by  himself  which  he  calls  A brief  account  of 
the  literary  undertakings  of  Hubert  Howe  Bancroft  (San  Francisco,  A.  L.  Bancroft  & Co.  [his  own  business 
house],  1882,  Svo,  pp.  12).  Other  accounts  of  his  library  will  be  found  in  the  American  Bibliopolist,  vii.  44 ; 
and  in  Apponyi’s  Libraries  of  California , 187S.  Descriptions  of  the  library  and  of  the  brick  building  (built  in 
1881)  which  holds  it,  and  of  his  organized  methods,  have  occasionally  appeared  in  the  Overland  Monthly  and 
in  other  serial  issues  of  California,  as  well  as  in  those  of  the  Atlantic  cities.  He  has  been  free  to  make  public 
the  most  which  is  known  regarding  his  work.  He  says  that  the  grouping  and  separating  of  his  material  has 
been  done  mostly  by  others,  who  have  also  written  fully  one  half  of  the  text  of  what  he  does  not  hesitate  to  call 
The  Works  of  Hubert  Howe  Bancroft ; and  he  leaves  the  reader  to  derive  a correct  understanding  of  the  case 
from  his  prefaces  and  illustrative  tracts.  Cf.  J.  C.  Derby’s  Fifty  Years  among  authors,  books,  and  publishers 
(New  York,  1884),  p.  31. 

7 Averaging  twelve  from  that  time  to  this  ; a hundred  persons  were  tried  for  every  one  ultimately  retained 
as  a valuable  assistant,  — is  his  own  statement. 

8 At  a cost,  as  he  says,  of  $80,000  to  18S2. 


AMERICANA,  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


IX 


clear  that  a new  force  had  been  brought  to  bear 
upon  historical  research,  — the  force  of  organ- 
ized labor  from  many  hands ; and  this  implied 
competent  administrative  direction  and  un- 
grudged expenditure  of  money.  The  work 
showed  the  faults  of  such  a method,  in  a want 
of  uniform  discrimination,  and  in  that  promis- 
cuous avidity  of  search,  which  marks  rather  an 
eagerness  to  amass  than  a judgment  to  select, 
and  give  literary  perspective.  The  book,  how- 
ever, was  accepted  as  extremely  useful  and 
promising  to  the  future  inquirer.  Despite  a 
certain  callowness  of  manner,  the  Native  Races 
was  extremely  creditable,  with  comparatively 
little  of  the  patronizing  and  flippant  air  which 
its  flattering  reception  has  since  begotten  in  its 
author  or  his  staff.  An  unfamiliarity  with  the 
amenities  of  literary  life  seems  unexpectedly  to 
have  been  more  apparent  also  in  his  later  work. 

In  April,  1876,  Mr.  Lewis  H.  Morgan  printed 
in  the  North  American  Review,  under  the  title 
of  “ Montezuma’s  Dinner,”  a paper  in  which  he 
controverted  the  views  expressed  in  the  Native 
Races  regarding  the  kind  of  aboriginal  civiliza- 
tion belonging  to  the  Mexican  and  Central 
American  table-lands.  A writer  of  Mr.  Mor- 
gan’s reputation  commanded  respect  in  all  but 
Mr.  Bancroft,  who  has  been  unwise  enough 
to  charge  him  with  seeking  “to  gain  notoriety 
by  attacking  ” his  (Mr.  B.’s)  views  or  supposed 
views.  He  dares  also  to  characterize  so  well- 
known  an  authority  as  “a  person  going  about 
from  one  reviewer  to  another  begging  condem- 
nation for  my  Native  Races.”  It  was  this  ungra- 
cious tone  which  produced  a divided  reception 
for  his  new  venture.  This,  after  an  interval 
of  seven  years,  began  to  make  its  appearance  in 
vol.  vi.  of  the  “ Works,”  or  vol.  i.of  the  History 
of  Central  America,  appearing  in  the  autumn  of 
1882. 

The  changed  tone  of  the  new  series,  its 
rhetoric,  ambitious  in  parts,  but  mixed  with 
passages  which  are  often  forceful  and  exact, 


suggestive  of  an  ill-assorted  conjoint  produc- 
tion ; the  interlarding  of  classic  allusions  by 
some  retained  reviser  who  served  this  purpose 
for  one  volume  at  least ; a certain  cheap  reason- 
ing and  ranting  philosophy,  which  gives  place  at 
times  to  conceptions  of  grasp ; flippancy  and 
egotism,  which  induce  a patronizing  air  under 
the  guise  of  a constrained  adulation  of  others ; 
a want  of  knowledge  on  points  where  the  system 
of  indexing  employed  by  his  staff  had  been 
deficient,  — these  traits  served  to  separate  the 
criticism  of  students  from  the  ordinary  laudation 
of  such  as  were  dazed  by  the  magnitude  of  the 
scheme. 

Two  reviews  challenging  his  merits  on  these 
grounds 1 induced  Mr.  Bancroft  to  reply  in  a 
tract 2 called  The  Early  American  Chroniclers. 
The  manner  of  this  rejoinder  is  more  offensive 
than  that  of  the  volumes  which  it  defends;  and 
with  bitter  language  he  charges  the  reviewers 
with  being  “ men  of  Morgan,”  working  in  con- 
cert to  prejudice  his  success. 

But  the  controversy  of  which  record  is  here 
made  is  unworthy  of  the  principal  party  to  it. 
His  important  work  needs  no  such  adventitious 
support;  and  the  occasion  for  it  might  have 
been  avoided  by  ordinary  prudence.  The  extent 
of  the  library  upon  which  the  work  3 is  based, 
and  the  full  citation  of  the  authorities  followed 
in  his  notes,  and  the  more  general  enumeration 
of  them  in  his  preliminary  lists,  make  the  work 
pre-eminent  for  its  bibliographical  extent,  how- 
ever insufficient,  and  at  times  careless,  is  the 
bibliographical  record.4 

The  library  formed  by  the  late  Henry  C. 
Murphy  of  Brooklyn  to  assist  him  in  his  pro- 
jected history  of  maritime  discovery  in  America, 
of  which  only  the  chapter  on  Verrazano5  has 
been  printed,  was  the  creation  of  diligent  search 
for  many  years,  part  of  which  was  spent  in 
Holland  as  minister  of  the  United  States.  The 
earliest  record  of  it  is  a Catalogue  of  an  Ameri- 
can library  chronologically  arranged,  which  was 


1 They  appeared  in  The  Nation  and  in  the  New  York  Independent  early  in  1883.  The  first  aimed  to 
show  that  there  wcie  substantial  grounds  for  dissent  from  Mr.  Bancroft’s  views  regarding  the  Aztec  civilization. 
The  second  ignored  that  point  in  controversy,  and  merely  proposed,  as  was  stated,  to  test  the  “bibliographic 
value”  which  Mr.  Bancroft  had  claimed  for  his  book,  and  to  point  out  the  failures  of  the  index  plan  and  the 
vicarious  system  as  employed  by  him. 

2 Seemingly  intended  to  make  part  of  one  of  the  later  volumes  of  his  series,  to  be  called  Essays  and 
Miscellanies. 

8 With  a general  title  (as  following  his  Native  Races')  of  The  History  of  the  Pacific  States , we  are  to  have 
in  twenty-eight  volumes  the  history  of  Central  America,  Mexico,  North  Mexico,  New  Mexico,  Arizona,  Cali- 
fornia, Nevada,  Utah,  Northwest  Coast,  Oregon,  Washington,  Idaho,  Montana,  British  Columbia,  and  Alaska, 
— to  be  followed  by  six  volumes  of  allied  subjects,  not  easily  interwoven  in  the  general  narrative,  making 
thirty-nine  volumes  for  the  entire  work.  The  volumes  are  now  appearing  at  the  rate  of  three  or  four  a year. 

* 1 he  list  which  is  piefixed  to  the  first  volume  of  the  History  of  California,  forming  vol.  xiii.  of  his 
Pacific  States  series,  is  particularly  indicative  of  the  rich  stores  of  his  library,  and  greatly  eclipses  the  previous 
lists  of  Mr.  A.  S.  Taylor,  which  appeared  in  the  Sacramento  Daily  Union,  June  25,  1S63.  and  March  13, 
1866.  Cf.  Harrisse,  Bill.  Amcr.  Vet.,  p.  xxxix.  A copy  of  Taylor’s  pioneer  work,  with  his  own  corrections’ 
is  in  Harvard  College  Library.  Mr.  Bancroft  speaks  very  ungraciously  of  it. 

5 See  Vol.  IV.,  chap.  i.  p.  19. 


X 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA- 


JAMES  CARSON  BREVOORT. 


privately  printed  in  a few  copies,  about  1850,  and 
showed  five  hundred  and  eighty-nine  entries 
between  the  years  1480  and  1800.1 

There  has  been  no  catalogue  printed  of  the 
library  of  Mr.  James  Carson  Brevoort,  so  well 
known  as  a historical  student  and  bibliographer, 
to  whom  Mr.  Sabin  dedicated  the  first  volume  of 
his  Dictionary.  Some  of  the  choicer  portions 
of  his  collection  are  understood  to  have  become 
a part  of  the  Astor  Library,  of  which  Mr.  Bre- 
voort was  for  a few  years  the  superintendent,  as 
well  as  a trustee.2 


The  useful  and  choice  collection  of  Mr. 
Charles  Deane,  of  Cambridge,  Mass.,  to  which, 
as  the  reader  will  discover,  the  Editor  has  often 
had  recourse,  has  never  been  catalogued.  Mr. 
Deane  has  made  excellent  use  of  it,  as  his  tracts 
and  papers  abundantly  show.3 

A distinct  class  of  helpers  in  the  field  of 
American  bibliography  has  been  those  gatherers 
of  libraries  who  are  included  under  the  some- 
what indefinite  term  of  collectors,  — owners  of 
books,  but  who  make  no  considerable  dependence 


1  Jackson,  Bill.  G'eog.,  no.  639;  Mcnzies  Catalogue,  nos.  1,459,  1,460;  Wynne’s  Private  Libraries 
of  New  York , p.  335.  Mr.  Murphy  died  Dec.  1,  1882,  aged  seventy-two;  and  his  collection,  then  very  much 
enlarged,  was  sold  in  March,  1884.  Its  Catalogue,  edited  by  Mr.  John  Russell  Bartlett,  shows  one  of  the 
richest  libraries  of  Americana  which  has  been  given  to  public  sale  in  America.  It  is  accompanied  by  a biograph 
ical  sketch  of  its  collector.  Cf.  Vol.  IV.  p.  22. 

2 Cf.  Wynne’s  Private  Libraries  of  New  York,  p.  106.  Mr.  Brevoort  died  December  7,  1887. 

3 Cf.  Sabin,  v.  283  ; Farnham’s  Private  Libraries  of  Boston. 


AMERICANA  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


xi 


CHARLES  DEANE. 


upon  them  for  studies  which  lead  to  publica- 
tion. From  such,  however,  in  some  instances, 
bibliography  has  notably  gained,  — as  in  the 
careful  knowledge  which  Mr.  James  Lenox  some- 
times dispensed  to  scholars  either  in  privately 
printed  issues  or  in  the  pages  of  periodicals. 

Harrisse  in  1866  pointed  to  five  Americana 
libraries  in  the  United  States  as  surpassing  all 
of  their  kind  in  Europe,  — the  Carter-Brown, 
Barlow,  Force,  Murphy,  and  Lenox  collections. 
Of  the  Barlow,  Force  (now  in  the  Library  of 
Congress),  and  Murphy  collections  mention  has 
already  been  made. 

The  Lenox  Library  is  no  longer  private, 
having  been  given  to  a board  of  trustees  by  Me. 


Lenox  previous  to  his  death,1  and  handsomely 
housed,  by  whom  it  is  held  for  a restricted  pub- 
lic use,  when  fully  catalogued  and  arranged.  Its 
character,  as  containing  only  rare  or  unusual 
books,  will  necessarily  withdraw  it  from  the 
use  of  all  but  scholars  engaged  in  recondite 
studies.  It  is  very  rich  in  other  directions  than 
American  history;  but  in  this  department  the 
partial  access  which  Harrisse  had  to  it  while 
in  Mr.  Lenox’s  house  led  him  to  infer  that  it 
would  hold  the  first  rank.  The  wealth  of  its 
alcoves,  with  their  twenty-eight  thousand  vol- 
umes, is  becoming  known  gradually  in  a series 
of  bibliographical  monographs,  printed  as  con- 
tributions to  its  catalogue,  of  which  six  have 


1 February,  1880,  aged  eighty  years.  His  father  was  Robert  Lenox,  a Scotchman,  who  began  business  in 
New  York  in  1783,  and  retired  in  1812  with  a large  fortune,  including  a farm  of  thirty  acres,  worth  then  about 
$6,000,  and  to-day  $ 10,000,000 , — if  such  figures  can  be  made  accurate.  Cf.  also  Charles  Deane  in  Amer.  Antiq. 
See.  Free.,  April,  18S0.  Henry  Stevens’s  Recoil,  of  Lenox  is  conspicuous  for  what  it  does  not  reveal. 


Xll 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


thus  far  appeared,  some  of  them  clearly  and 
mainly  the  work  of  Mr.  Lenox  himself. 

Of  these  only  three  have  illustrated  Amer- 
ican history  in  any  degree,  — those  devoted  to 
the  voyages  of  Hulsius  and  Thevenot,  and  to  the 
Jesuit  Relations  (Canada).1 

The  only  rival  of  the  Lenox  is  the  library  of 
the  late  John  Carter  Brown,  of  Providence,  gath- 
ered largely  under  the  supervision  of  John  Rus- 
sell Bartlett;  and  since  Mr.  Brown’s  death  it 
has  been  more  particularly  under  the  same  over- 
sight.2 It  differs  from  the  Lenox  Library  in  that 
it  is  exclusively  American,  or  nearly  so,3  and 
still  more  in  that  we  have  access  to  a thorough 
catalogue  of  its  resources,  made  by  Mr.  Bartlett 
himself,  and  sumptuously  printed.4  It  was  origi- 
nally issued  as  Bibliotheca  Americana:  A Cata- 
logue of  books  relating  to  North  and  South  Amer- 
ica in  the  Library  of  John  Carter  Brown  of  Prov- 
idence, with  notes  by  John  Russell  Bartlett,  in  three 
volumes,  — vol.  i.,  1493-1600,  in  1865  (302  en- 
tries); vol.  ii.,  1601-1700,  in  1866  (1,160  entries) ; 
vol.  iii.,  1701-1800,  in  two  parts,  in  1870-1871 
(4,173  entries). 

In  1875  vol.  i.  was  reprinted  with  fuller  titles, 
covering  the  years  I4825-i6oi,  with  600  entries, 
doubling  the  extent  of  that  portion.6  Numer- 
ous fac-similes  of  titles  and  maps  add  much  to 


its  value.  A second  and  similarly  extended  edi- 
tion of  vol.  ii.  (1600-1700)  was  printed  in  1882, 
showing  1,642  entries.  The  Carter-Browti  Cata- 
logue, as  it  is  ordinarily  cited,  is  the  most  exten- 
sive printed  list  of  all  Americana  previous  to 
1800,  more  especially  anterior  to  1700,  which  now 
exists.7 

Of  the  other  important  American  catalogues, 
the  first  place  is  to  be  assigned  to  that  of  the 
collection  formed  at  Hartford  by  Mr.  George 
Brinley,  the  sale  of  which  since  his  death  8 has 
been  undertaken  under  the  direction  of  Dr.  J. 
Hammond  Trumbull,9  who  has  prepared  the  cat- 
alogue, and  who  claims  — not  without  warrant  — 
that  it  embraces  ‘‘  a greater  number  of  volumes 
remarkable  for  their  rarity,  value,  and  interest 
to  special  collectors  and  to  book-lovers  in  gen- 
eral, than  were  ever  before  brought  together  in 
an  American  sale-room.” 19 

The  library  of  William  Menzies,  of  New  York, 
was  sold  in  1875,  from  a catalogue  made  by 
Joseph  Sabin,11  The  library  of  Edward  A. 
Crowninshield,  of  Boston,  was  catalogued  in  Bos- 
ton in  1859,  but  withdrawn  from  public  sale, 
and  sold  to  Henry  Stevens,  who  took  a portion 
of  it  to  London.  It  was  not  large,  — the  cata- 
logue shows  less  than  1,200  titles,  — and  was 
not  exclusively  American ; but  it  was  rich  in 


1 The  Lenox  Library  is  now  under  the  direction  of  the  distinguished  American  historical  student,  Dr.  George 
H.  Moore,  so  long  in  charge  of  the  New  York  Historical  Society’s  library.  Cf.  an  account  of  Dr.  Moore  by 
Howard  Crosby  in  the  Historical  Magazine,  vol.  xvii.  (January,  1870).  The  officer  in  immediate  charge  of  the 
library  is  Dr.  S.  Austin  Allibone,  well  known  for  his  Dictionary  of  Authors. 

2 Mr.  Bartlett  was  early  in  life  a dealer  in  books  in  New  York;  and  the  Americana  catalogues  of 
Bartlett  and  Welford,  forty  years  ago,  were  among  the  best  of  dealers’  lists.  Jackson’s  Bibl.  Geog., 
no.  641. 

8  The  field  of  Americana  before  1800  has  been  so  nearly  exhausted  in  its  composition,  that  recent  purchases 
have  been  made  in  other  departments,  particularly  of  costly  books  on  the  fine  arts. 

4 Cf.  Vol.  III.  p.  380. 

6  Because  Greenland  in  the  map  of  the  Ptolemy  of  this  year  is  laid  down.  The  slightest  reference  to 
America  in  books  of  the  sixteenth  century  have  entitled  them  to  admission. 

6 The  book  purports  to  have  been  printed  in  one  hundred  copies ; but  not  more  than  half  that  number,  it 
is  said,  have  been  distributed.  Some  copies  have  a title  reading,  Bibliographical  notices  of  rare  and  curious 
books  relating  to  America,  printed  in  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries,  in  the  library  of  the  late  John  Carter 
Brown,  by  John  Russell  Bartlett. 

7 Sir  Arthur  Helps,  in  referring  to  the  assistance  he  had  got  from  books  sent  to  him  from  America,  and 
from  this  library  in  particular,  says : “ As-  far  as  I have  been  able  to  judge,  the  American  collectors  of  books 
are  exceedingly  liberal  and  courteous  in  the  use  of  them,  and  seem  really  to  understand  what  the  object  should 
be  in  forming  a great  library.”  Spanish  Conquest,  American  edition,  p.  122. 

8 Cf.  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  October,  1875. 

9 Dr.  Trumbull  himself  has  been  a keen  collector  of  books  on  American  history,  particularly  in  illustration 
of  his  special  study  of  aboriginal  linguistics ; while  his  influence  has  not  been  unfelt  in  the  forming  of  the 
Watkinson  Library,  and  of  that  of  the  Connecticut  Historical  Society,  both  at  Hartford. 

10  The  first  sale  — there  are  to  be  four  — took  place  in  March,  1878,  and  illustrated  a new  device  in  testa- 
mentary bequests.  Mr.  Brinley  devised  to  certain  libraries  the  sum  of  several  thousand  dollars  each,  to  be  used 
to  their  credit  for  purchases  made  at  the  public  sale  of  his  books.  The  result  was  a competition  that  carried 
the  aggregate  of  the  sales,  it  is  computed,  as  much  beyond  the  sum  which  might  otherwise  have  been  obtained, 
as  was  the  amount  devised,  — thus  impairing  in  no  degree  the  estate  for  the  heirs,  and  securing  credit  for 
public  bequests.  The  scheme  has  been  followed  in  the  sale  of  the  library  (the  third  part  of  which  was  Americana, 
largely  from  the  Menzies  library)  of  the  late  J.  J.  Cooke,  of  Providence,  with  an  equivalent  appreciation  of  the 
prices  of  the  books.  It  is  a question  if  the  interests  of  the  libraries  benefited  are  advanced  by  such  artificial 
stimulation  of  prices,  which  a factitious  competition  helps  to  make  permanent. 

11  A?nerican  Bibliopolist,  viii.  128;  Wynne’s  Private  Libraries  of  New  York,  p.  318.  The  collection  was 
not  exclusively  American. 


AMERICANA,  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


xiii 


some  of  the  rarest  of  such  books,  particularly  in 
regard  to  the  English  Colonies.1 

The  sale  of  John  Allan’s  collection  in  New 
York,  in  1864,  was  a noteworthy  one.  Americana, 
however,  were  but  a portion  of  the  collection.2 
An  English-American  flavor  of  far  less  fineness, 
but  represented  in  a catalogue  showing  a very 
large  collection  of  books  and  pamphlets,3 * *  was 
sold  in  New  York  in  May,  1870,  as  the  property 
of  Mr.  E.  P.  Boon. 

Mr.  Thomas  W.  Field  issued  in  1873  An 
Essay  towards  an  Indian  Bibliography,  being  a 
Catalogue  of  books  relating  to  the  American  In- 
dians, in  his  own  library,  with  a few  others 
which  he  did  not  possess,  distinguished  by  an 
asterisk.  Mr.  Field  added  many  bibliographical 
and  historical  notes,  and  gave  synopses,  so  that 
the  catalogue  is  generally  useful  to  the  student 
of  Americana,  as  he  did  not  confine  his  survey 
to  works  dealing  exclusively  with  the  aborigines. 
The  library  upon  which  this  bibliography  was 
based  was  sold  at  public  auction  in  New  York, 
in  two  parts,  in  May,  1875  (3,324  titles),  accord- 
ing to  a catalogue  which  is  a distinct  publication 
from  the  Essay.* 

The  collection  of  Mr.  Almon  W.  Griswold 
was  dispersed  by  printed  catalogues  in  1876  and 
1880,  the  former  containing  the  American  por- 
tion, rich  in  many  of  the  rarer  books. 

Of  the  various  private  collections  elsewhere 
than  in  the  United  States,  more  or  less  rich  in 
Americana,  mention  may  be  made  of  the  Biblio- 
theca Mcjicana 6 of  Augustin  Fischer,  London, 
1869;  of  the  Spanish-American  libraries  of  Gre- 
gorio Beeche,  whose  catalogue  was  printed  at 
Valparaiso  in  1879;  and  that  of  Benjamin  Vi- 
cuna Mackenna,  printed  at  the  same  place  in 
1 861. 6 * 

In  Leipsic,  the  catalogue  of  Serge  Sobo- 
lewski  (1873) 7 was  particularly  helpful  in  the 
bibliography  of  Ptolemy,  and  in  the  voyages  of 


De  Bry  and  others.  Some  of  the  rarest  of 
Americana  were  sold  in  the  Sunderland  sale8 
in  London  in  1881-1883 ; and  remarkably  rich 
collections  were  those  of  Pinart  and  Bourbourg,9 
sold  in  Paris  in  1883,  and  that  of  Dr.  J.  Court,10 
the  first  part  of  which  was  sold  in  Paris  in  May, 
1884.  The  second  part  had  little  of  interest. 

Still  another  distinctive  kind  of  bibliogra- 
phies is  found  in  the  catalogues  of  the  better 
class  of  dealers ; and  among  the  best  of  such  is  to 
be  placed  the  various  lists  printed  by  Henry  Ste- 
vens, a native  of  Vermont,  who  has  spent  most 
of  his  manhood  in  London.  In  the  dedication 
to  John  Carter  Brown  of  his  Schedule  of  Nuggets 
(1870),  he  gives  some  account  of  his  early  bibli- 
ographical quests.11  Two  years  after  graduating 
at  Yale,  he  says,  he  had  passed  “at  Cambridge, 
reading  passively  with  legal  Story,  and  actively 
with  historical  Sparks,  all  the  while  sifting  and 
digesting  the  treasures  of  the  Harvard  Library. 
For  five  years  previously  he  had  scouted  through 
several  States  during  his  vacations,  prospecting 
in  out-of-the-way  places  for  historical  nuggets, 
mousing  through  town  libraries  and  country  gar- 
rets in  search  of  anything  old  that  was  histor- 
ically new  for  Peter  Force  and  his  American 
Archives.  . . . From  Vermont  to  Delaware  many 
an  antiquated  churn,  sequestered  hen-coop,  and 
dilapidated  flour-barrel  had  yielded  to  him  rich 
harvests  of  old  papers,  musty  books,  and  golden 
pamphlets.  Finally,  in  1845,  an  irrefragable 
desire  impelled  him  to  visit  the  Old  World,  its 
libraries  and  book-stalls.  Mr.  Brown’s  enlight- 
ened liberality  in  those  primitive  years  of  his 
bibliographical  pupilage  contributed  largely  to- 
wards the  boiling  of  his  kettle.  ...  In  acquiring 
con  amore  these  American  Historiadores  Prim- 
itives, he  . . . travelled  far  and  near.  In  this 
labor  of  love,  this  journey  of  life,  his  tracks  often 
become  your  tracks,  his  labors  your  works,  his 


1 Memoir  of  Mr.  Crowninshield,  by  Charles  Deane,  in  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  xvii.  356.  Mr.  Stevens  is 
said  to  have  given  about  $9,500  for  the  library.  It  was  sold  in  various  parts,  the  more  extensive  portion 
in  July,  i860.  Allibone,  vol.  ii.  p.  2,248. 

2 This  collection  — which  Mr.  Allan  is  said  to  have  held  at  $15,000 — brought  $39,000  at  auction  after 
his  death. 

8 Another  catalogue  rich  in  pamphlets  relating  to  America  is  that  of  Albert  G.  Greene,  New  York,  1869. 

4 The  Catalogue  is  more  correctly  printed  than  the  Essay.  Sabin,  Bibliog.  of  Bibliog.,  p.  exxv. 

6 Bibliotheca  Mcjicana , a collection  of  books  relating  to  Mexico,  and  North  and  South  America  ; sold  by 
Puttick  & Simpson  in  London,  June,  1869.  (About  3,000  titles.) 

6 Jackson,  Bill.  Geog.,  nos.  844,  845. 

1 Catalogue  de  la  collection  prccicuse  de  livres  anciens  et  modernes  formant  la  Bibliothique  de  feu  M. 
Serge  Sobolcwsii  ( de  Moscou ) Leipsic,  1873. 

3 Bibliotheca  Sundcrlandiana.  Sale  Catalogue  of  the  Sunderland  or  Blenheim  Library.  Five  Parts. 

London,  1881-1883.  (13,85s  nos.) 

9 Catalogue  de  livres  rares  et precieux,  manuscrits  et  imprimis,  principalcmcnt  sur  V Amcrique  ct  sur  les 

langues  du  mondc  entier,  composant  la  bibliothique  de  Alphonse  L.  Pinart,  ct  comprenant  en  totalite  la  biblio- 

thique Mcxico-Guatcmalicnne  de  M.  I'abbe  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg.  Paris,  1883.  viii.  248  pp.  8°. 

10  Catalogue  de  la  precieusc  bibliothique  de  feu  M.  le  Doctcur  J.  Cturt , comprenant  une  collection  unique 

de  voyageurs  ct  d’historiens  relatifs  h /’ Amcrique.  Premilre  partie.  Paris,  1884.  (458  nos.) 

11  There  is  an  account  of  his  family  antecedents,  well  spiced  as  his  wont  is,  in  the  introduction  to  his 

Bibliotheca  Historica,  1870. 


XIV 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


libri  your  liberi ,”  he  adds,  in  addressing  Mr. 
Brown. 

In  1848  Mr.  Stevens  proposed  the  publica- 
tion, through  the  Smithsonian  Institution,  of  a 
general  Bibliographia  Americana,  illustrating  the 
sources  of  early  American  history  ; 1 but  the  pro- 
ject failed,  and  one  or  more  attempts  later  made 
to  begin  the  work  also  stopped  short  of  a be- 
ginning. While  working  as  a literary  agent  of 
the  Smithsonian  Institution  and  other  libraries, 
in  these  years,  and  beginning  that  systematic 
selection  of  American  books,  for  the  British 
Museum  and  Bodleian,  which  has  made  these 
libraries  so  nearly,  if  not  quite,  the  equal  of  any 
collection  of  Americana  in  the  United  States,  he 
also  made  the  transcriptions  and  indexes  of  the 
documents  in  the  State  Paper  Office  which  re- 
spectively concern  the  States  of  New  Jersey, 
Rhode  Island,  Maryland,  and  Virginia.  These 
labors  are  now  preserved  in  the  archives  of  those 
States.2  Perhaps  the  earliest  of  his  sale  cat- 
alogues was  that  of  a pseudo  “ Count  Mondi- 
dier,”  embracing  Americana,  which  were  sold  in 
London  in  December,  1851.3  His  English  Li- 
brary in  1853  was  without  any  distinctive  Amer- 
ican flavor;  but  in  1854  he  began, but  suspended 
after  two  numbers,  the  American  Bibliographer 
(100  copies).4  In  1856  he  prepared  a Catalogue 
of  Attiericati  Books  and  Maps  in  the  British  Mu- 
seum (20,000  titles),  which,  however,  was  never 
regularly  published,  but  copies  bear  date  1859, 
1862,  and  1866.5  In  1858  — though  most  copies 
are  dated  1862  6 — appeared  his  Historical  Nug- 
gets; Bibliotheca  Americana,  or  a descriptive  Ac- 
count of  my  Collection  of  rare  books  relating  to  A mer- 
ica.  The  two  little  volumes  show  about  three  thou- 
sand titles,  and  Harrisse  says  they  are  printed 
“ with  remarkable  accuracy.”  There  was  begun 
in  1885,  in  connection  with  his  son  Mr.  Henry 
Newton  Stevens,  a continuation  of  these  Nug- 
gets. In  1861  a sale  catalogue  of  his  Bibliotheca 
Americana  (2,415  lots),  issued  by  Puttick  and 
Simpson,  and  in  part  an  abridgment  of  the  Nug- 
gets with  similarly  careful  collations,  was  accepted 


by  Maisonneuve  as  the  model  of  his  Bibliotheque 
Americaine  later  to  be  mentioned.7 

In  1869-1870  Mr.  Stevens  visited  America,  and 
printed  at  New  Haven  his  Historical  and  Geo- 
graphical Notes  o i the  earliest  discoveries  in  Amer- 
ica, 1453-1530,  with  photo-lithographic  fac-similes 
of  some  of  the  earliest  maps.  It  is  a valuable 
essay,  much  referred  to,  in  which  the  author 
endeavored  to  indicate  the  entanglement  of  the 
Asiatic  and  American  coast  lines  in  the  early 
cartography.8 9 

In  1870  he  sold  at  Boston  a collection  of  five 
thousand  volumes,  catalogued  as  Bibliotheca  His- 
torical (2,545  entries),  being  mostly  Americana, 
from  the  library  of  the  elder  Henry  Stevens  of 
Vermont.  It  has  a characteristic  introduction, 
with  an  array  of  readable  notes.10  His  catalogues 
have  often  such  annotations,  inserted  on  a prin- 
ciple which  he  explains  in  the  introduction  to 
this  one  : “ In  the  course  of  many  years  of  bibli- 
ographical study  and  research,  having  picked  up 
various  isolated  grains  of  knowledge  respecting 
the  early  history,  geography,  and  bibliography 
of  this  western  hemisphere,  the  writer  has 
thought  it  well  to  pigeon-hole  the  facts  in  notes 
long  and  short.” 

In  October,  1870,  he  printed  at  London  a 
Schedule  of  Two  Thousand  American  Historical 
Nuggets  taketi  fro7ti  the  Steve7is  Diggi/tgs  in 
Septe7)iber,  1870,  a7id  set  down  in  Chro7tological 
Order  of  Pri7iti7ig  from  1490  to  1800  [1776],  de- 
scribed a72 d recotnttiesided  as  a Suppleme7it  to  my 
pri7itcd  Bibliotheca  A77iericana.  It  included  1,350 
titles. 

In  1872  he  sold  another  collection,  largely 
Americana,  according  to  a catalogue  entitled 
Bibliotheca  Geographica  Historica  ; or,  a Cat- 
alogue of  [3,109  AA],  illustrative  of  historical  geog- 
raphy a7id  geographical  history.  Collected,  used, 
and  described,  with  a7i  Bitroductory  Essay  on 
Catalogues,  and  how  to  7nake  tlie77i  upon  the  Ste- 
vens system  of  photo-bibliography.  The  title  calls 
it  a first  part ; but  no  second  part  ever  appeared. 
Ten  copies  were  issued,  with  about  four  hundred 


1 Triibner,  Bibliographical  Guide  to  American  Literature  (1859),  p.  iv. ; North  Atnericati  Review,  July, 
1850,  p.  205,  by  George  Livermore. 

2 Allibone,  ii.  2247-2248. 

8 Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  49,961. 

4 Stevens,  Historical  Collections,  i.  874.  It  was  ostensibly  made  in  preparation  for  his  projected  Bibli 
ographia  Americana. 

5 Historical  Collections,  vol.  i.  no.  90 ; Allibone,  vol.  ii.  p.  2248. 

6 Allibone,  ii.  2248;  Historical  Collectio7is,  vol.  i.  no.  875  ; Bibliotheca  Historica  (1870),  no.  1,974. 

7 Allibone,  ii.  2248  ; Historical  Collections,  vol.  i.  no.  878. 

8 It  was  first  published,  less  perfectly,  in  the  American  Journal  of  Science,  vol.  xcviii.  p.  299 ; and  of  the 
separate  issue  seventy-five  copies  only  were  printed.  Bibliotheca  Historica  (1870),  no.  1,976.  It  was  also  issued 
as  a part  of  a volume  on  the  proposed  Tehuantepec  Railway , prepared  by  his  brother,  Simon  Stevens,  and  pub- 
lished by  the  Appletons  of  New  York  the  same  year.  Ibid.  no.  1,977;  Historical  Collections,  vol.  i.  nos.  894 
895;  Allibone,  vol.  ii.  p.  2348,  nos.  17,  18,  19. 

9 Historical  Collections,  vol.  i.  no.  897. 

10  It  is  a droll  fancy  of  his  to  call  his  book-shop  the  “ Nuggetory  to  append  to  his  name  “ G.  M.  B.,”  foi 
Green  Mountain  Boy;  and  even  to  parade  in  a similar  titular  fashion  his  rejection  at  a London  Club,  — “Bk- 
bid  — Ath.-Cl.” 


AMERICANA,  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


xv 


photographic  copies  of  titles  inserted.  Some 
copies  are  found  without  the  essay.1 

The  next  year  (1873)  he  issued  a privately 
printed  list  of  two  thousand  titles  of  American 
“ Continuations,"  as  they  are  called  by  librari- 
ans, or  serial  publications  in  progress  as  taken  at 
the  British  Museum,  quaintly  terming  the  list 
American  books  with  tails  to  ’em .2 

Finally,  in  1881,  he  printed  Part  I.  of  Ste- 
vens’s Historical  Collections , a sale  catalogue 
showing  1,625  titles  of  books,  chiefly  Americana, 
and  including  his  Franklin  Collection  of  man- 
uscripts, which  he  later  privately  sold  to  the 
United  States  Government,  an  agent  of  the  Bos- 
ton Public  Library  yielding  to  the  nation.3 

One  of  the  earliest  to  establish  an  antiquarian 
bookshop  in  the  United  States  was  the  late 
Samuel  G.  Drake,  who  opened  one  in  Boston  in 
1830.4  His  special  field  was  that  of  the  North 
American  Indians ; and  the  history  and  antiqui- 
ties of  the  aborigines,  together  with  the  history 
of  the  English  Colonies,  give  a character  to  his 
numerous  catalogues.5  Mr.  Drake  died  in  1875, 
from  a cold  taken  at  a sale  of  the  library  of 
Daniel  Webster;  and  his  final  collections  of 
books  were  scattered  in  two  sales  in  the  follow- 
ing year.0 


William  Gowans,  of  New  York,  was  another 
of  the  early  dealers  in  Americana.7  The  cat- 
alogues of  Bartlett  and  W elford  have  already  been 
mentioned.  In  1854,  while  Garrigue  and  Chris- 
tern  were  acting  as  agents  of  Mr.  Lenox,  they 
printed  Livres  Curieux,  a list  of  desiderata 
sought  for  by  Mr.  Lenox,  pertaining  to  such  rari- 
ties as  the  letters  of  Columbus,  Cartier,  parts  of 
De  Bry  and  Hulsius,  and  the  Jesuit  Relations. 
This  list  was  circulated  widely  through  Europe, 
but  not  twenty  out  of  the  216  titles  were  ever 
offered.8 

About  1856,  Charles  B.  Norton,  of  New 
York,  began  to  issue  American  catalogues;  and 
in  1857  he  established  Norton’s  Literary  Letter, 
intended  to  foster  interest  in  the  collection  of 
Americana.9  A little  later,  Joel  Munsell,  of 
Albany,  began  to  issue  catalogues ; 10  and  J.  W. 
Randolph,  of  Richmond,  Virginia,  more  partic- 
ularly illustrated  the  history  of  the  southern 
parts  of  the  United  States.11  The  most  impor- 
tant Americana  lists  at  present  issued  by  Amer- 
ican dealers  are  those  of  Robert  Clarke  & Co., 
of  Cincinnati,  which  are  admirable  specimens  of 
such  lists.12 

In  England,  the  catalogues  of  Henry  Stevens 
and  E.  G.  Allen  have  been  already  mentioned. 


1 Historical  Collections , vol.  i.  no.  898. 

2 Historical  Collections , vol.  i.  no.  899. 

3 The  public  is  largely  indebted  to  the  efforts  of  Mr.  Theodore  F.  Dwight,  the  librarian  and  keeper  of  the 
Archives  of  the  Department  of  State  at  Washington,  for  the  ultimate  success  of  the  endeavor  to  secure  these 
manuscripts  to  the  nation.  Mr.  Stevens  had  lately  (1885)  formed  a copartnership  with  his  son,  Mr.  Henry’  N. 
Stevens,  and  had  begun  a new  series  of  Catalogues,  of  which  No.  r gives  his  own  publications,  and  No.  2 is  a 
bibliography  of  New  Hampshire  History.  He  died  in  London,  February  28,  1S86. 

4 N.  E.  Hist,  and  Gencal.  Reg.,  1863,  p.  203.  Dr.  Homes,  of  Albany,  is  confident  Joseph  Bumstead  was 
earlier  in  Boston  than  Mr.  Drake.  The  Boston  Directory  represents  him  as  a printer  in  1800,  and  as  a book- 
seller after  1816. 

5 His  earliest  catalogue  appeared  in  1842,  as  of  his  private  library.  Sabin’s  Bill,  of  Bibl.,  p.  xlix.  A 
collection  announced  for  sale  in  Boston  in  1845  was  withdrawn  after  the  catalogue  was  printed,  having  been 
sold  to  the  Connecticut  Historical  Society  for  $4,000.  At  one  time  he  amassed  a large  collection  of  American 
school-books  to  illustrate  our  educational  history.  They  were  bought  (about  four  hundred  in  all)  by  the  British 
Museum. 

6 Cf.  Jackson’s  Bibl.  Geog.,  no.  684,  and  pp.  185,  199.  Also  see  Vol.  III.  361. 

7 His  catalogues  are  spiced  with  annotations  signed  “Western  Memorabilia.”  Sabin  ( Dictionary , vii.  369) 
quotes  the  saying  of  a rival  regarding  Gowans’s  catalogues,  that  their  'notes  “ were  distinguished  by  much  origi- 
nality, some  personality,  and  not  a little  bad  grammar.”  His  shop  and  its  master  are  drawn  in  F.  B.  Perkins’s 
Scrope , or  the  Lost  Library.  A Noveh  Mr.  Gowans  died  in  November,  1870,  at  sixty-seven,  leaving  a stock, 
it  is  said,  of  250,000  bound  volumes,  besides  a pamphlet  collection  of  enormous  extent.  Mr.  W.  C.  Prime  told 
the  story  of  his  life,  genially,  in  Harper’s  Magazine  (1872),  in  an  article  on  “ Old  Books  in  New  York.”  Speak- 
ing of  his  stock,  Mr.  Prime  says : “ There  were  many  more  valuable  collections  in  the  hands  of  booksellers,  but 
none  so  large,  and  probably  none  so  wholly  without  arrangement.”  Mr.  Gowans  was  a Scotchman  by  birth,  and 
came  to  America  in  1821.  After  a varied  experience  on  a Mississippi  flat-boat,  he  came  to  New  York,  and  in 
1827  began  life  afresh  as  a bookseller’s  clerk.  Cf.  American  Bibliopolist,  January,  1871,  p.  5. 

8 Harrisse,  Bibl.  Amcr.  Vet.,  p.  xxx. 

9 Jackson,  Bibl.  Geog.,  nos.  670-676. 

10  Jackson,  no.  687.  See  Vol.  IV.  p.  435.  Munsell  issued  privately,  in  1872,  a catalogue  of  the  works 
printed  by  him.  Sabin,  Bibl.  of  Bibl.,  p.  cv.  Cf.  a Biographical  Sketch  of  Joel  M7insell,  by  George  R. 
Howell,  with  a Genealogy  of  the  Munsell  Family,  by  Frank  Munsell.  Boston,  1880.  This  was  printed 
(16  pp.)  for  the  New  England  Historic  Genealogical  Society. 

11  Jackson,  no.  669. 

12  They  have  been  issued  in  1869,  1871,  1873,  1876,  1877,  1878,  1879,  1883.  Jackson,  nos.  705-711.  Lesser 
lists  have  been  issued  in  Cincinnati  by  William  Dodge.  The  chief  dealer  in  Americana  in  Boston,  who  issues 
catalogues,  is,  at  the  present  time,  Mr.  George  E.  Littlefield. 


XVI 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  leading  English  dealer  at  present  in  the 
choicer  books  of  Americana,  as  of  all  other  sub- 
jects — and  it  is  not  too  much  to  say,  the  leading 
one  of  the  world  — is  Mr.  Bernard  Quaritch, 
a Prussian  by  birth,  who  was  born  in  1819, 
and  after  some  service  in  the  book-trade  in 
his  native  country  came  to  London  in  1842, 
and  entered  the  service  of  Henry  G.  Bohn, 
under  whose  instruction,  and  as  a fellow-em- 
ploye of  Lowndes  the  bibliographer,  he  laid  the 
foundations  of  a remarkable  bibliographical  ac- 
quaintance. A short  service  in  Paris  brought 
him  the  friendship  of  Brunet.  Again  (1845) 
he  returned  to  Mr.  Bohn’s  shop ; but  in  April, 
1847,  he  began  business  in  London  for  him- 
self. He  issued  his  catalogues  at  once  on  a 
small  scale ; but  they  took  their  well-known 
distinctive  form  in  1848,  which  they  have  re- 
tained, except  during  the  interval  December, 
1854, -May,  1864,  when,  to  secure  favorable  con- 
sideration in  the  post-office  rates,  the  serial 
was  called  The  Museum.  It  has  been  his  habit, 
at  intervals,  to  collect  his  occasional  catalogues 
into  volumes,  and  provide  them  with  an  index. 
The  first  of  these  (7,000  entries)  was  issued 
in  i860.  Others  have  been  issued  in  1864,  1868, 
1870,  1874,  1877  (this  with  the  preceding  con- 
stituting one  work,  showing  nearly  45,000  entries 
or  200,000  volumes),  and  1880  (describing  28,- 
009  books).1  In  the  preface  to  this  last  cata- 
logue he  says:  “The  prices  of  useful  and 
learned  books  are  in  all  cases  moderate ; the 
prices  of  palaeographical  and  bibliographical 
curiosities  are  no  doubt  in  most  cases  high, 
that  indeed  being  a natural  result  of  the  great 
rivalry  between  English,  French,  and  American 
collectors.  ...  A fine  copy  of  any  edition  of 
a book  is,  and  ought  to  be,  more  than  twice  as 
costly  as  any  other.”2  While  the  Quaritch 
catalogues  have  been  general,  they  have  in- 
cluded a large  share  of  the  rarest  Americana, 


whose  titles  have  been  illustrated  with  biblio 
graphical  notes  characterized  by  intimate  ac- 
quaintance with  the  secrets  of  the  more  curious 
lore. 

The  catalogue.,  of  John  Russell  Smith  (1849, 
1853,  1865,  1867),  and  of  his  successor  Alfred 
Russell  Smith  (1871,  1874),  are  useful  aids  in 
this  department.3  The  Bibliotheca  Hispano- 
Americana  of  Triibner,  printed  in  1870,  offered 
about  thirteen  hundred  items.4 *  Occasional 
reference  can  be  usefully  made  to  the  lists  of 
George  Bumstead,  Ellis  and  White,  John  Cam- 
den Hotten,  all  of  London,  and  to  those  of 
William  George  of  Bristol.  The  latest  exten- 
sive Americana  catalogue  is  A catalogue  of  rare 
and  curious  books,  all  of  which  relate  more  or  less 
to  America,  on  sale  by  F.  S.  Ellis,  London,  1884. 
It  shows  three  hundred  and  forty-two  titles,  in- 
cluding many  of  the  rarer  books,  which  are  held 
at  prices  startling  even  to  one  accustomed  to  the 
rapid  rise  in  the  cost  of  books  of  this  description. 
Many  of  them  were  sold  by  auction  in  1885. 

In  France,  since  Ternaux,  the  most  impor- 
tant contribution  has  come  from  the  house  of 
Maisonneuve  et  Cie.,  by  whom  the  Bibliotheca 
Americana  of  Charles  Leclerc  has  been  succes- 
sively issued  to  represent  their  extraordinary 
stock.  The  first  edition  was  printed  in  186 7 
(1,647  entries),  the  second  in  18786  (2,638  en- 
tries, with  an  admirable  index),  besides  a first 
supplement  in  1881  (nos.  2,639-3,029).  Mr. 
Quaritch  characterizes  it  as  edited  “with  ad- 
mirable skill  and  knowledge.” 

Less  important  but  useful  lists,  issued  in 
France,  have  been  those  of  Hector  Bossange, 
Edwin  Tross,6  and  the  current  Americana  series 
of  Dufosse,  which  was  begun  in  1876.7 

In  Holland,  most  admirable  work  has  been 
done  by  Frederik  Muller,  of  Amsterdam,  and  by 
Mr.  Asher,  Mr.  Tiele,  and  Mr.  Otto  Harrasso- 
witz  under  his  patronage,  of  which  ample  ac- 


1 Another  is  now  in  progress. 

2 With  these  canons  Mr.  Quaritch’s  prices  can  be  understood.  The  extent  and  character  of  his  stock  can 
be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  his  purchases  at  the  Perkins  sale  (1873)  amounted  to  £1 1,000 ; at  the  Tite  sale 
(1874),  £9,500;  at  the  Didot  sales (1878-1879),  £11,600  ; and  at  the  Sunderland  sales  (1883),  £32,650,  out  of  a 
total  of  £56,851.  At  the  recent  sales  of  the  Beckford  and  Hamilton  collections,  which  produced  £86,444,  over 
one  half,  or  £44,105,  went  to  Mr.  Quaritch.  These  figures  enable  one  to  understand  how,  in  a sense,  Mr.  Quar- 
itch commands  the  world’s  market  of  choice  books.  A sketch,  B.  Q.,  a biographical  and  bibliographical  Frag • 
ment  (1880,  25  copies),  in  the  privately  printed  series  of  monographs  issued  to  a club  in  London,  of  which  Mr. 
Quaritch  is  president,  called  “The  Sette  of  Odd  Volumes,”  has  supplied  the  above  data.  The  sketch  is  by  C. 
W.  H.  Wyman,  and  is  also  reprinted  in  his  Bibliography  of  Printing,  and  in  the  Antiquarian  Magazine  and 
Bibliographer , November,  1882.  One  of  the  club’s  “opuscula  ” (no.  iii.)  has  an  excellent  likeness  of  Mr.  Quar- 
itch prefixed.  Cf.  also  the  memoir  and  portrait  in  Bigmore  and  Wyman’s  Bibliography  of  Printing,  ii.  230. 

3 Jackson,  nos.  643-649;  Triibner,  Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  xix. 

4 Mr.  Triibner  died  in  London  March  30,  1884.  Cf.  memorial  in  The  Library  Chronicle , April,  1884, 

p.  43,  by  W.  E.  A.  Axon ; also  a “ Nekrolog”  by  Karl  J.  Triibner  in  the  Centralblatt  fur  Bibliothekswesen, 
June,  1884,  p.  240. 

6 Cf.  notice  by  Mr.  Brevoort  in  Magazine  of  American  History,  iv.  230. 

® There  is  a paper  on  “Edwin  Tross  et  ses  publications  relatives  & l’Amerique ” in  Miscellanies  bibli* 
graphiques,  Paris,  1878,  p.  53,  giving  a list  of  his  imprints  which  concern  America. 

7 Jackson,  nos.  689,  703,  717. 


AMERICANA,  IN  LIBRARIES  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHIES. 


xvn 


counts  are  given  in  another  place.1  Muller’s 
catalogues  were  begun  in  1850,  but  did  not  reach 
distinctive  merit  till  1872.2  Martin  Nijhoff,  at 
the  Hague,  has  also  issued  some  American  cata- 
logues. 

In  1858  Muller  sold  one  of  his  collections  of 
Americana  to  Brockhaus,  of  Leipsic,  and  the 
Bibliotheque  Americaine  issued  by  that  publisher 
in  1861,  as  representing  this  collection,  was  com- 
piled by  one  of  the  editors  of  the  Serapeum, 
Paul  Tromel,  whom  Harrisse  characterizes 
as  an  “expert  bibliographer  and  trustworthy 
scholar.”  The  list  shows  435  entries  by  a chro- 
nological arrangement  ( 1 507-1 700).3  Brockhaus 
again,  in  1866,  issued  another  American  list, 
showing  books  since  1508,  arranged  topically 
(nos.  7,261-8,611).  Mr.  Otto  Harrassowitz,  of 
Leipsic,  a pupil  of  Muller,  of  Amsterdam,  has 
also  entered  the  field  as  a purveyor  of  choice 
Americana.  T.  O.  Weigel,  of  Leipsic,  issued  a 
catalogue,  largely  American,  in  1877. 

So  well  known  are  the  general  bibliographies 
of  Watt,  Lowndes,  Brunet,  Graesse,  and  others, 
that  it  is  not  necessary  to  point  out  their  distinc- 
tive merits.4  Students  in  this  field  are  familiar 
with  the  catalogues  of  the  chief  American  libra- 
ries. The  library  of  Harvard  College  has  not 
issued  a catalogue  since  1834,  though  it  now  prints 
bulletins  of  its  current  accessions.  An  admirable 
catalogue  of  the  Boston  Athenaeum  brings  the 
record  of  that  collection  down  to  1871.  The 
numerous  catalogues  of  the  Boston  Public  Li- 
brary are  of  much  use,  especially  the  distinct 
volume  given  to  the  Prince  Collection.  The 
Massachusetts  Historical  Society’s  library  has 
a catalogue  printed  in  1859-60.  There  has  been 
no  catalogue  of  the  American  Antiquarian  Society 


since  1837,  and  the  New  England  Historic  Gene- 
alogical Society  has  never  printed  any;  nor  has 
the  Congregational  Library.  The  State  Library 
at  Boston  issued  a catalogue  in  1880.  These  li- 
braries, with  the  Carter-Brown  Library  at  Provi- 
dence, which  is  courteously  opened  to  students 
properly  introduced,  probably  make  Boston 
within  easy  distance  of  a larger  proportion  of 
the  books  illustrating  American  history,  than 
can  be  reached  with  equal  convenience  from  any 
other  literary  centre.  A book  on  the  private  li- 
braries of  Boston  was  compiled  by  Luther  Farn- 
ham  in  1855;  but  many  of  the  private  collections 
then  existing  have  since  been  scattered.5  Gen- 
eral Horatio  Rogers  has  made  a similar  record 
of  those  in  Providence.  After  the  Carter-Brown 
Collection,  the  most  valuable  of  these  private 
libraries  in  New  England  is  probably  that  of  Mr. 
Charles  Deane  in  Cambridge,  of  which  mention 
has  already  been  made.  The  collection  of  the 
Rev.  Henry  M.  Dexter,  D.D.,  of  New  Bedford, 
is  probably  unexampled  in  this  country  for  the 
history  of  the  Congregational  movement,  which 
so  largely  affected  the  early  history  of  the  Eng- 
lish Colonies.6 

Two  other  centres  in  the  United  States  are 
of  the  first  importance  in  this  respect.  In  Wash- 
ington, with  the  Library  of  Congress  (of  which 
a general  consolidated  catalogue  is  now  print- 
ing), embracing  as  it  does  the  collection  formed 
by  Col.  Peter  Force,  and  supplementing  the 
archives  of  the  Government,  an  investigator  of 
American  history  is  situated  extremely  favora- 
bly.7 In  New  York  the  Astor  and  Lenox  libra- 
ries, with  those  of  the  New  York  Historical 
Society  and  American  Geographical  Society,  give 
the  student  great  opportunities.  The  catalogue 
of  the  Astor  Library  was  printed  in  1857-66, 


1 Vol.  IV.  chap.  viii.  editorial  note.  There  is  an  account  of  Muller  and  his  bibliographical  work  in  the 
Centralblatt  fiir  Bibliothckswescn,  November,  1884. 

2 Jackson,  nos.  650-654;  Triibner,  Bibliographical  Guide,  p.  xix ; Sabin,  Bibliog.  of  Bibliog.,  p.  cv; 
Petzholdt,  Bibliotheca  Bibliographica. 

8 This  collection  was  subsequently,  with  the  exception  of  three  lots,  bought  of  Mr.  Brockhaus  by  Henry 
Stevens.  Bibliotleeca  Gcographica,  no.  343. 

4 More  or  less  help  will  be  derived  from  the  American  portion  of  the  Liste  provisoire  de  bibliographies 
gcographiqucs  specialcs,  par  James  Jackson,  published  in  18S1  by  the  Socidtd  de  G6ographie  de  Paris,  — a 

book  of  which  use  has  been  made  in  the  preceding  pages. 

6 See  the  chapter  on  the  libraries  of  Boston  in  the  Memorial  History  of  Boston,  vol.  iv. 

6 The  extent  of  Dr.  Dexter’s  library  is  evident  from  the  signs  of  possession  which  are  so  numerously  scat- 
tered through  the  7,250  titles  that  constitute  the  exhaustive  and  very  careful  bibliography  of  Congregationalism 
and  the  allied  phases  of  religious  history,  which  forms  an  appendix  to  his  Congregationalism  as  seen  in  its 
Literature,  New  York,  1880.  He  explains  in  the  Introduction  to  his  volume  the  wide  scope  which  he  intended 
to  give  to  this  list ; and  to  show  how  poorly  off  our  largest  public  libraries  in  America  are  in  the  earliest  books 
illustrating  this  movement,  he  says  that  of  the  r,ooo  earliest  titles  which  he  gives,  and  which  bear  date 
between  1546  and  1644,  'le  f°und  only  208  in  American  libraries.  His  arrangement  of  titles  is  chronological, 
but  he  has  a full  name-index. 

The  students  of  the  early  English  colonies  cannot  fail  to  find  for  certain  phases  of  their  history  much  help 
from  Joseph  Smith’s  Descriptive  Catalogue  of  Friends'  Books , London,  1867  ; his  Bibliotheca  Anti-Quakeriana, 
1873;  and  his  Bibliotheca  Quakeristica,  a bibliography  of  miscellaneous  literature  relating  to  the  Friends,  of 
which  Part  I.  was  issued  in  London  in  1883. 

7 The  private  library  of  George  Bancroft  is  in  Washington.  It  is  described  as  it  existed  some  years  ago 
in  Wynne’s  Private  Libraries  of  New  York. 

VOL.  I.  — A 


xviii  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


and  that  of  the  Historical  Society  in  1859.  No 
general  catalogue  of  the  Lenox  Library  has  yet 
been  printed.  An  account  of  the  private  libra- 
ries of  New  York  was  published  by  Dr.  Wynne 
in  i860.  The  libraries  of  the  chief  importance 
at  the  present  time,  in  respect  to  American  his- 
tory, are  those  of  Mr.  S.  L.  M.  Barlow  in  New 
York,  and  of  Mr.  James  Carson  Brevoort  in 
Brooklyn.  Mr.  Charles  H.  Kalbfleisch  of  New 
York  has  a small  collection,  but  it  embraces 
some  of  the  rarest  books.  The  New  York  State 
Library  at  Albany  is  the  chief  of  the  libraries  of 
its  class,  and  its  principal  characteristic  pertains 
to  American  history. 

The  other  chief  American  cities  are  of  much 
less  importance,  as  centres  for  historical  research. 
The  Philadelphia  Library  and  the  collection  of 
the  Historical  Society  of  Pennsylvania  are  hardly 


of  distinctive  value,  except  in  regard  to  the  his- 
tory of  that  State.  In  Baltimore  the  library  of 
the  Peabody  Institute,  of  which  the  first  volume 
of  an  excellent  catalogue  has  been  printed,  and 
that  of  the  Maryland  Historical  Society  are 
scarcely  sufficient  for  exhaustive  research.  The 
private  library  of  Mr.  H.  H.  Bancroft  consti- 
tutes the  only  important  resource  of  the  Pacific 
States ; 1 and  the  most  important  collection  in 
Canada  is  that  represented  by  the  catalogue  of 
the  Library  of  Parliament,  which  was  printed  in 
1858. 

This  enumeration  is  intended  only  to  in- 
dicate the  chief  places  for  ease  of  general 
investigation  in  American  history.  Other  lo- 
calities are  rich  in  local  helps,  and  accounts 
of  such  will  be  found  elsewhere  in  the  present 
History.2 


1 A book  on  the  private  libraries  of  San  Francisco  by  Apponyi  was  issued  in  1878. 

2 An  account  of  the  libraries  of  the  various  historical  societies  in  the  United  States  is  given  in  the  Public 
Libraries  of  the  United  States,  issued  by  the  Bureau  of  Education  at  Washington  in  1S76. 


INTRODUCTION. 

By  the  Editor. 


Part  II.  THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA  AND  COLLECTIVE 
ACCOUNTS  OF  THE  EARLY  VOYAGES  THERETO. 


OF  the  earliest  collection  of  voyages  of 
which  we  have  any  mention  we  possess 
only  a defective  copy,  which  is  in  the  Biblio- 
teca  Marciana,  and  is  called  Libretto  de  tutla 
la  navigazione  del  Rl  di  Spagna  dclle  isole  e ter- 
reni  nuovamente  scoperti  stampato  per  Vcrcellese. 
It  was  published  at  Venice  in  1504,1  and  is  said 
to  contain  the  first  three  voyages  of  Columbus. 
This  account,  together  with  the  narrative  of 


Cabral’s  voyage  printed  at  Rome  and  Milan, 
and  an  original  — at  present  unknown  — of 
Vespucius’  third  voyage,  were  embodied,  with 
other  matter,  in  the  Paesi  novamente  retrcrvati 
et  novo  mondo  da  Alberico  Vesputio  Florentino 
intilulato,  published  at  Vicentia  in  1507, 2 and 
again  possibly  at  Vicentia  in  150S,  — though 
the  evidence  is  wanting  to  support  the  state- 
ment, — but  certainly  at  Milan  in  that  year 


1 The  title  is  quoted  differently  by  different  authorities.  Harrisse,  Bill.  Amcr.  Vet .,  no.  32,  and  Additions, 
no.  16;  his  Christophe  Colomb , i.  89  ; Humboldt,  Examcn  critique,  iv.  67;  Sabin,  Dictionary  of  Books 
relating  to  America,  x.  327;  D’Avezac,  Waltzcmiillcr,  p.  79;  Vamhagen,  Nouvclles  Rccherclies,  p.  17; 
Irving’s  Columbus,  app.  ix. 

2 See  Vol.  IV.  p.  12.  The  editorship  is  in  dispute,  — whether  Zorzi  or  Montalboddo.  The  better  opinion 
seems  to  be  that  Humboldt  erred  in  assigning  it  to  Zorzi  rather  than  to  Montalboddo.  Cf.  Humboldt,  Examcn 
critique;  Brunet,  v.  1155,  1158:  Sabin,  Dictionary , vol.  xii.  no.  50,050;  D’Avezac,  Waltzcmiillcr , p.  So; 
Graesse,  Tresor ; Harrisse,  Bibl.  Amcr.  Vet.,  nos.  4S,  109.  app.  p.  469,  and  Additions,  no.  26;  Bulletin  de 
la  Socictc  de  Geographic,  October,  1S57,  p.  312  ; Santarem’s  Vespucius,  Eng.  tr.,  p.  73  ; Irving’s  Columbus, 
app.  xxx.  ; Navarrete,  Opitsculos,  i.  101  ; Harrisse,  Christophe  Colomb,  i.  89.  There  are  copies  of  this  1507 
edition  in  the  Lenox  and  Carter-Brown  libraries,  and  in  the  Grenville  Library ; and  one  in  the  Beckford  sale, 
1882  (no.  186),  brought  £270.  Cf.  also  Murphy  Catalogue,  no.  2,612*,  and  Catalogue  de  la  precicuse  biblio- 
thique  de  feu  M.  Ic  Docteur  J.  Court  (Paris,  1S84),  no.  262.  The  Paesi  novamente  retrovaii  is  shown  in  the 
chapter  on  the  Cortereals  in  Vol.  IV.  to  be  of  importance  in  elucidating  the  somewhat  obscure  story  of  that 
portion  of  the  early  Portuguese  discoveries  in  North  America.  Since  Vol.  IV.  was  printed,  two  important  con- 
tributions to  this  study  have  been  made.  One  is  the  monograph  of  Henry  Harrisse,  Lcs  Cortercal  ct  leur 
voyages  ait  Nouvcau-mondc.  D’apris  des  documents  nouveaux  ou  pen  connus  tires  des  archives  de  Lisbonne et 
de  Modhic.  Suivi  du  texte  inedit  d'un  recit  dc  la  troisihne  expedition  de  Gasper  Cortcreal  et  d’une  carte 
nautique  portugaise  de  1502  reproduite  ici  pour  la  premiire  fois.  Memoir e lit  h l'  Acadcmie  des  inscriptions 
ct  belles-lettres  dans  sa  seance  du  ter  juin,  1883,  and  published  in  Paris  in  18S3,  as  Vol.  III.  of  the  Recucil  de 
voyages  ct  de  documents  pour  servir  h Vhistoire  de  la  geographic  dcpitis  le  Xllle  jitsqit'h  la  fin  du  XVIe  silcle. 
The  other  is  the  excerpt  from  the  Archivo  des  Azores,  which  was  drawn  from  that  work  by  the  editor,  Ernesto 
do  Canto,  and  printed  separately  at  Ponta  Delgarda  (S.  Miguel)  in  an  edition  of  one  hundred  copies,  under  the 
title  of  Os  Cortc-Rcaes,  memoria  historica  accompanhada  dc  muitos  documentos  ineditos.  Do  Canto  refers 
(p.  34)  to  other  monographs  on  the  Portuguese  discoveries  in  America  as  follows  : Sebastiao  Francisco  Mendo 
Trigoso,  — Ensaio  sobre  os  Descobrimentos  e Commercio  dos  Portuguczes  cm  as  Terras  Septcntrionaes  da 
America,  presented  to  the  Lisbon  Academy  (1813),  and  published  in  their  Mcmorias  da  Littcratura,  viii.  305. 
Joaquim  J ose  Gonsalves  de  Mattos  Correa,  — Acerca  da  prioridade  das  Descobcrtas  feitas  pclos  portuguczes 
nas  costas  orientaes  da  America  do  norte,  which  was  printed  in  Annaes  maritimos  e Coloniaes,  Lisbon,  1S41, 
pp.  269-423.  Luciano  Cordeiro,  — Dc  la  part  prise  par  lcs  Porhtgais  dans  le  decouverte  dc  P Amcrique, 
Lisbon,  1876.  This  was  a communication  made  to  the  Congrks  des  Americanistes  in  1875.  Cf.  Vol.  IV.  p.  15. 


XX 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


(1508).1  There  were  later  editions  in  1512, 2 
1 5 1 7,3  15194  (published  at  Milan),  and  1521.5 
There  are  also  German,6  Low  German,7  Latin,8 
and  French  9 translations. 

While  this  Zorzi-Montalboddo  compilation 
was  flourishing,  an  Italian  scholar,  domiciled  in 
Spain,  was  recording,  largely  at  first  hand,  the 
varied  reports  of  the  voyages  which  were  then 
opening  a new  existence  to  the  world.  This 
was  Peter  Martyr,  of  whom  Harrisse 10  cites  an 
early  and  quaint  sketch  from  Hernando  Alonso 
de  Herrera’s  Disputatio  adversus  Aristotelez 
(1517). 11  The  general  historians  have  always 
made  due  acknowledgment  of  his  service  to 
them.12 

Harrisse  could  find  no  evidence  of  Martyr’s 


First  Decade  having  been  printed  at  Seville  as 
early  as  1500,  as  is  sometimes  stated ; but  it  has 
been  held  that  a translation  of  it,  — though  no 
copy  is  now  known,  — made  by  Angelo  Trigvi- 
ano  into  Italian  was  the  Libretto  de  tutta  la 
navigazione  del  Rl  di  Spagna,  already  men- 
tioned.13 The  earliest  unquestioned  edition  was 
that  of  1 51 1,  which  was  printed  at  Seville  with 
the  title  Legatio  Babylonica ; it  contained  nine 
books  and  a part  of  the  tenth  book  of  the  First 
Decade.14  In  1516  a new  edition,  without  map, 
was  printed  at  Alcala  in  Roman  letter.  The 
part  of  the  tenth  book  of  the  First  Decade  in 
the  1 51 1 edition  is  here  annexed  to  the  ninth, 
and  a new  tenth  book  is  added,  besides  two  other 
decades,  making  three  in  all.15 


1 Harrisse,  Bill.  Amer  Vet.,  no.  55  ; D’Avezac,  Waltzemiiller,  p.  80 ; Wieser,  Magalhacs-Strassc, 
pp.  15,  17.  There  are  copies  in  the  Lenox,  Carter-Brown,  Harvard  College,  and  Cincinnati  Public  libraries. 
The  Beckford  copy  brought,  in  1882,  .£78.  Quaritch  offered  a copy  in  1883  for  .£45.  At  the  Potier  sale,  in 
1870  (no.  1,791),  a copy  brought  2,015  francs;  the  same  had  brought  389  francs  in  1844  at  the  Nodier  sale. 
Livres  payes  cn  vente  publiquc  1,000  francs  et  au  dessus,  1877,  p.  77.  Cf.  also  Court,  no.  263. 

2 Only  one  copy  in  the  United  States,  says  Sabin. 

3 In  Carter-Brown  and  Lenox  libraries  ; also  in  the  Marciana  and  Brera  libraries.  Leclerc  in  1878  priced 
a copy  at  1,000  francs.  Cf.  Harrisse,  no.  90,  also  p.  463,  and  Additions , no.  52 ; Sobolewski,  no.  4,130; 
Brunet,  v.  1158  ; Court,  no.  264. 

4 Sabin,  vol.  xii.  ho.  50,054  ; Leclerc,  no.  2,583  (500  Ataxies).  A copy  was  sold  in  London  in  March,  1883. 
There  is  a copy  in  the  Cincinnati  Public  Library. 

5 Harrisse,  no.  109  ; Sobolewski,  no.  4,131  ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  68  ; Murphy,  no.  2,617. 

6 Nave  unbekanthe  landte  (Nuremberg,  1508),  by  Ruchamer ; copies  are  in  the  Lenox,  Carter-Brown,  Con- 
gress, and  Cincinnati  Public  libraries.  Cf.  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  50,056 ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  36  ; Harrisse, 
no.  57;  Murphy,  no.  2,613;  Sobolewski,  no.  4,069;  D’Avezac,  Waltzemiiller , p.  83;  Rosenthal,  Catalogue 
(1884),  r.o.  67,  at  1,000  marks. 

7 Nye  unbekande  Landc  (1508),  in  Platt-Deutsch,  by  Henning  Ghetel,  of  Lubeck,  following  the  German. 
Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  50,057;  Harrisse,  Additions , no.  29.  The  Carter-Brown  copy  ( Catalogue , vol.  i.  no.  37) 
cost  about  1,000  marks  at  the  Sobolewski  (no.  4,070)  sale,  when  it  was  described  as  an  “ Edition  absolument 
incor.nu  jusqu’au  present.”  Mr.  C.  H.  Kalbfleisch  has  since  secured  a copy  at  3,000  marks,  — probably  the 
copy  advertised  “ as  the  second  copy  known,”  by  Albert  Cohn,  of  Berlin,  in  1881,  in  his  /Catalog,  vol.  cxxxix. 
no.  27.  Cf.  Studi  biografici  e bibliografici  della  Societh  Italiana,  i.  219. 

8 Itinerariu  Portugallesiu  e Lusitania  in  India  (Milan,  1508),  a Latin  version  by  Archangelus  Madri- 
nanus,  of  Milan.  Cf.  D'Avezac,  Waltzemiiller,  p.  82;  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  50,05s;  Harrisse,  no.  58;  Sobo- 
lewski, no.  4,128;  Muller  (1870),  no.  1,844.  There  are  copies  in  the  Lenox,  Barlow,  Harvard  College, 
Carter-Brown  ( Catalogue , vol.  i.  no.  35),  and  Congressional  libraries.  The  Beckford  copy  (no.  1,081)  brought 
.£78.  Sabin  quotes  Bolton  Corney’s  copy  at  ,£137.  Copies  have  been  recently  priced  at  T30,  .£36,  and  T45. 
A copy  noted  in  the  Court  Catalogue  (no.  177)  differs  from  Harrisse’s  collation. 

9 Sensuyt  le  nouveau  mode,  supposed  to  be  1515  ; some  copies  vary  in  text.  The  Lenox  Library  has  two 
varieties.  Cf.  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  nos.  50,059,  50,061  ; Harrisse,  no.  83,  and  Additions,  no.  46 ; D’Avezac, 
Waltzemiiller,  p.  84.  An  edition  of  1516  (Le  nouveau  monde)  is  in  the  Carter-Brown  and  Lenox  libraries 
(Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  50,062;  Court,  no.  248  ; Harrisse,  no.  86 ; Sobolewski,  no.  4,129).  One  placed  in  1521 
(Sensuyt  le  nouveau,  mode)  is  in  Harvard  College  Library  (Harrisse,  no.  in  ; Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  50,063).  An- 
other (Sensuyt  le  nouveau  monde)  is  placed  under  1528  (Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  50,064;  Harrisse,  no.  146,  and 
Additions,  no.  87). 

10  Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  50.  Harrisse  also  gives  a chapter  to  Peter  Martyr  in  his  Cliristophc  Colomb,  i.  85. 

11  See  also  the  reference  in  Joannes  Tritemius’  De  scriptoribus  ecclesiasticis  (Cologne,  1546),  pp.  481-482. 
There  have  been  within  a few  years  two  monographs  upon  Martyr:  (1)  Hermann  A.  Schumacher’s  Petrus 
Martyr,  der  Geschichtsschreiber  des  Weltmecrcs  (New  York,  1879);  (2)  Dr.  Heinrich  Heidenheimer’s  Petrus 
Martyr  Anglerius  und  sein  Opus  cpistolarum  (Berlin,  18S1).  This  last  writer  gives  a section  to  his  geo- 
graphical studies. 

12  Humboldt,  Examen  critique,  ii.  279 ; Irving,  Columbus,  app. ; Prescott,  Ferdinand  and  Isabella 
(1873),  ii-  74>  nnd  Mexico,  ii.  96;  II.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  i.  312;  Helps,  Spanish  Conquest 
Cf.  Harrisse,  Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  nos.  66  and  160. 

13  Morelli’s  edition  of  Letter  of  Columbus,  1810. 

14  There  is  an  examination  of  this  edition  on  page  109  of  Vol.  II. 

15  Harrisse,  Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  88  ; Carter-Brown  Catalogue,  vol.  i.  no.  50 ; Huth,  p.  920 ; Brunet, 
i.  293;  Murphy,  no.  1,606;  Leclerc,  no.  2,647  (600  francs) ; Stevens,  Nuggets , Tio  10s. ; Bibliotheca  Grew 
villiana.  There  is  a copy  in  Charles  Deane’s  collection.  Tross  priced  a copy  in  1S73  at  900  francs. 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA. 


xxi 


There  exists  what  has  been  called  a German 
version  {Die  Schiffung  mitt  dem  lanndt  der  Gul- 
den Insel)  of  the  First  Decade,  in  which  the 
supposed  author  is  called  Johan  von  Angliara; 
and  its  date  is  1520,  or  thereabout;  but  Mr. 
Deane,  who  has  the  book, 
says  that  it  is  not  Martyr’s.1 
Some  Poemala , which  had 
originally  been  included  in 
the  publication  of  the  First 
Decade,  were  separately 
printed  in  1520.'2 

At  Basle  in  1521  appeared 
his  De  nuper  sub  D.  Carolo 
repertis  insulis,  the  title  of 
which  is  annexed  in  fac- 
simile. Harrisse  3 has  called 
it  an  extract  from  the  Fourth 
Decade;  and  a similar  state- 
ment is  made  in  the  Carter- 
Brown  Catalogue  (vol.  i.  no. 

67).  But  Stevens  and  other 
authorities  define  it  as  a sub- 
stitute for  the  lost  First  Let- 
ter of  Cortes,  touching  the 
expedition  of  Grijalva  and 
the  invasion  of  Mexico  ; and 
it  supplements,  rather  than 
overlaps,  Martyr’s  other  nar- 
ratives.4 Mr.  Deane  contends 
that  if  the  Fourth  Decade  had 
then  been  written,  this  might 
well  be  considered  an  abridg- 
ment of  it. 

The  first  complete  edition 
[De  orbe  novo)  of  all  the  eight 
decades  was  published  in  1 530 
at  Complutum  ; and  with  it  is 
usually  found  the  map  (“  Ti- 
pus  orbis  universalis  ”)  of 
Apianus,  which  originally  ap- 
peared in  Camer’s  Solinus  in 
1520.  In  this  new  issue  the 
map  has  its  date  changed  to 
1 S30-5 6 

In  1 532,  at  Paris,  appeared 
an  abridgment  in  French  of 
the  first  three  decades,  to- 


gether with  an  abstract  of  Martyr’s  De  insulis 
(Basle,  1521),  followed  by  abridgments  of  the 
printed  second  and  third  letters  of  Cortes,  — the 
whole  bearing  the  title,  Extraict  ov  Recveil  des 
Isles  nouuellemet  trouuees  en  la  grand  tner  Oceane 


TITLE  OF  THE  NEWE  UNBEKANTHE  LANDTE  (REDUCED). 


1 Carter-Brown  Catalogue , vol.  i.  no.  61  ; Graesse,  Trcsor,  i.  130;  Sabin,  i.  201,  who  says  Rich  put  it 
under  1560. 

2 Bill.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  62  ; Additions,  p.  78. 

8 Bib/.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  no. 

4 There  are  copies  in  Harvard  College  and  Carter-Brown  libraries.  Cf.  Sabin,  i.  199 ; Leclerc,  no.  24 

(150  francs)  ; Court,  no.  13;  Murphy,  no.  1,606*;  Stevens,  Historical  Collection,  i.  4S ; his  Nuggets,  £2  2 s. 
But  recent  prices  have  been  £20  and  .£25  ; Brunet,  i.  294 ; Ternaux,  no.  24  ; Sunderland,  vol.  iv.  no.  8,173. 
This' tract  was  reprinted  in  the  Novus  orbis  (Basle,  1532),  and  was  appended  to  the  Antwerp  edition  (1536)  of 
Brocard’s  Dcscriptio  tcrrcc  sanctee  (Harrisse,  Bib/.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  21S  ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  117).  It  is 
also  in  the  Novus  orbis  of  Rotterdam,  1596  (Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  505). 

6 There  are  copies  in  the  Harvard  College,  Lenox,  and  Carter-Brown  libraries.  It  is  very  rare ; a fair  copy 
was  priced  in  London,  in  1SS1,  at  .£62.  Cf.  Brunet,  i.  293  ; Carter-Brown  Catalogue , vol.  i.  no.  94;  Sabin, 
i.  198  ; Harrisse,  Bib/.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  154  ; Murphy,  no.  1,607  i Court,  no.  14. 


XXII 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA.  xxili 


en  temps  du  roy  Despaigne  Fertidd  Elizabeth 
sa  femme,  faict  premierement  en  latin  par  Pierre 
Martyr  de  Millan,  &>  depuis  translate  en  lan- 
guage francoysf 

In  1533,  at  Basle,  in  folio,  we  find  the  first 
three  decades  and  the  tract  of  1521  {De  insulis ) 
united  in  De  rebus  oceanicis  et  orbe  novo. 2 

At  Venice,  in  1534,  the  Summaries  de  la  gen- 
erate historia  de  A Indie  occidentali  was  a joint 
issue  of  Martyr  and  Oviedo,  under  the  editing 
of  Ramusio.3  An  edition  of  Martyr,  published 
at  Paris  in  1536,  sometimes  mentioned,4  does 
not  apparently  exist;5  but  an  edition  of  1537 
is  noted  by  Sabin.6  In  1555  Richard  Eden’s 
Decades  of  the  I/ewe  IVorlde,  or  West  India,  ap- 
peared in  black-letter  at  London.  It  is  made  up 
in  large  part  from  Martyr,7  and  was  the  basis 
of  Richard  Willes’  edition  of  Eden  in  1577, 
which  included  the  first  four  decades,  and  an 
abridgment  of  the  last  four,  with  additions  from 


Oviedo  and  others,  — all  under  the  new  name, 
The  History  of  Trauayle .8 

There  was  an  edition  again  at  Cologne  in 
1574,  — the  one  which  Robertson  used.9  Three 
decades  and  the  De  insulis  are  also  included  in 
a composite  folio  published  at  Basle  in  1582, 
containing  also  Benzoni  and  Levinus,  all  in 
German.10  The  entire  eight  decades,  in  Latin, 
which  had  not  been  printed  together  since  the 
Basle  edition  of  1530,  were  published  in  Paris 
in  1587  under  the  editing  of  Richard  Hakluyt, 
with  the  title : De  orbe  nirvo  Petri  Martyris 
Anglerii  Mediolanensis,  protonotarij,  et  Caroli 
quinti  senatoris  Decades  octo,  diligenti  temporum 
obseruatiotie,  et  vtilissimis  annotationibus  illus- 
trates, sudque  nitori  restitutes,  labore  et  industria 
Richardi  Haklvyti  Oxoniensis  Angli.  Additus 
est  in  vsinn  lectoris  accuratus  totius  operis  index. 
Parisiis,  apud  Gvillelmvm  Avvray,  1587.  With 
its  “ F.  G.”  map,  it  is  exceedingly  rare.11 


1 The  book  is  very  rare.  There  is  a copy  in  Harvard  College  Library.  A copy  was  priced  in  London  at 
£36  ; but  Quaritch  holds  the  Beckford  copy  (no.  2,275),  in  fine  binding,  at  £148.  Harrisse  (Bibl.  Amer.  Vet., 
no.  167)  errs  in  his  description.  Cf.  Brunet,  i.  294;  Sobolewski,  no.  3,667;  Sabin,  i.  T99;  Huth,  p.  920; 
Stevens,  Historical  Collections , i.  48 ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  99 ; Murphy,  no.  3.002  ; Court,  no.  124. 

2 Richard  Eden’s  copy  of  this  book,  with  his  annotations,  apparently  used  in  making  his  translation  of 

1 555,  was  sold  in  the  Brinley  sale,  no.  40,  having  been  earlier  in  the  Judge  Davis  sale  in  1847  (no.  1,352). 
The  first  of  the  Stevens  copies,  in  his  sale  of  1870  (nos.  75,  1,234),  is  now  in  Mr.  Deane’s  library.  There  are 
also  copies  in  the  Force  (Library  of  Congress),  Carter-Brown  (Catalogue,  vol.  i.  no.  104),  and  Ticknor  ( Cata- 
logue., p.  14)  collections,  and  in  Harvard  College  Library.  Cf.  Sabin,  i. ; Stevens’s  Nuggets,  £1  11s.  6 d.; 

Temaux,  no.  47;  Harrisse,  Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  176;  Muller  (1877),  no.  2,031;  Court,  no.  15;  Murphy, 

no.  1,608;  Leclerc  (1878),  no.  25  (80  francs)  ; Quaritch,  no.  11,628  (£3  10 s.  ; again,  .£5  5.?.)  ; Sunderland, 
vol.  iv.  no.  8,176  (.£50).  Priced  in  Germany  at  60  and  100  marks. 

8 Ramusio’s  name  does  not  appear,  but  D’Avezac  thinks  his  editorship  is  probable ; cf.  Bulletin  de  la 
Socletc  de  Geographic  (1872),  p.  11.  There  are  copies  in  Harvard  College,  Carter-Brown,  J.  C.  Brevoort,  H.  C. 
Murphy,  and  Lenox  libraries.  For  an  account  of  a map  said  to  belong  to  it,  see  Winsor’s  Bibliography  of 
Ptolemy,  sub  anno  1540.  Cf.  Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  190;  Stevens,  Historical  Collections,  vol.  i.  no.  344,  and 
Nuggets,  vol.  ii.  no.  1,808  ; Murphy,  no.  1,609;  Sunderland,  vol.  iv.  no.  8,177  ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  107; 

Temaux,  no.  43;  Court,  no.  213.  Ramusio  also  included  Martyr  in  the  third  volume  of  his  Navigatiosii.  Cf. 

the  opinions  of  Mr.  Deane  and  Mr.  Brevoort  on  the  Summario  as  given  in  Vol.  II'I.  p.  20. 

4 Brunet,  Graesse,  Temaux. 

6 Harrisse,  Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  214.  6 Vol.  i.  p.  199. 

7 See  Vol.  111.  p.  200;  Murphy,  no.  1,610. 

8 The  book  is  rare;  the  copy  in  the  Menzies  sale  (no.  1,332)  brought  $42.50.  Cf.  further  in  Vol.  III. 
p.  204;  also  Cooke,  no.  1,642. 

9 It  has  three  decades  and  three  books  of  the  “ De  Babylonica  legatione.”  There  are  copies  in  Harvard 
College  and  the  Carter-Brown  libraries.  Cf.  Rich  (1832),  no.  52;  Nuggets,  £1  10 s.  6d. ; Sabin,  i.  201  ; Muller, 
(1877),  no.  2,031;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  295;  Leclerc,  no.  26  (80  francs);  Harrassowitz,  35  marks; 
Quaritch,  £1  5.1.  and  £1  i6r. ; Sunderland,  vol.  iv.  no.  8,178  ; O’Callaghan,  no.  1,479  ; Cooke,  no.  1,641 ; Court, 
no.  16;  Murphy,  no.  1,61 1. 

I9  Graesse,  i.  130;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  344;  Stevens  (1870),  no.  1,235. 

11  The  Sunderland  copy  (vol.  iv.  no.  8,179),  with  the  map,  brought  £24  ; a French  catalogue  advertised  one 
with  the  map  for  250  francs.  Without  the  map  it  is  worth  about  $25.  See  further  in  Vol.  III.  p.  42  ; also  Mur- 
phy, no.  1,612  ; Cooke,  no.  1,643;  Court,  no.  17.  Hakluyt’s  text  was  used  by  Lok  in  making  an  English  ver- 
sion (he  adopted,  however,  Eden’s  text  of  the  first  three  decades),  which  was  printed  as  De  Novo  Orbe  ; or,  the 
Historic  of  the  West  Indies.  Bibliographers  differ  about  the  editions.  One  without  date  is  held  by  some  to 
have  been  printed  in  1597  (White-Kennett ; Field,  Indian  Bibliography,  no.  1,013;  Menzies,  no.  1,333,  $35  > 
Huth,  p.  923);  but  others  consider  it  the  sheets  of  the  1612  edition  with  a new  title  (see  Vol.  III.  p.  47, 
Field,  no.  1,014;  Stevens,  1870,  no.  1,236;  Harrisse,  Notes  071  Colmnbus,  p.  10;  O’Callagban,  no.  1,481; 
Murphy,  no.  1,612*;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  nos.  129,  130).  There  are  copies  of  this  1612  edition  in  the  Boston 
Athenaeum,  Harvard  College,  Carter-Brown,  and  Massachusetts  Historical  Society  libraries ; it  is  worth  from 
$30  to  $40.  Mr.  Deane’s  edition  of  1612  has  a dedication  to  Julius  Caesar,  the  English  jurist  of  that  day, 
which  is  not  in  the  edition  without  date.  See  Vol.  III.  p.  47.  The  same  was  reissued  as  a “second  edition,” 
with  a title  dated  1628,  of  which  there  is  a copy  in  Harvard  College  Library  (Field,  no.  1,015;  Stevens, 
Nuggets,  £4  14.1.  6 d.\  Menzies,  no.  1,334/  Griswold,  no.  475  ; Quaritch,  £9  and  .£12). 


XXIV 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


GRYN7EUS.1 


As  illustrating  in  some  sort  his  more  labored 
work,  the  Opus  epistolarum  Petri  Martyris  was 
first  printed  at  Complutum  in  1530.2  The  letters 
were  again  published  at  Amsterdam,  in  1670, 3 in 
an  edition  which  had  the  care  of  Ch.  Patin,  to 
which  was  appended  other  letters  by  Fernando 
del  Pulgar.4 

The  most  extensive  of  the  early  collec- 
tions was  the  Novus  orbis,  which  was  issued  in 
separate  editions  at  Basle  and  Paris  in  1532. 
Simon  Grynaeus,  a learned  professor  at  Basle, 


signed  the  preface ; and  it  usually  passes  under 
his  name.  Grynaeus  was  born  in  Swabia,  was  a 
friend  of  Luther,  visited  England  in  1531,  and 
died  in  Basic,  in  1541.  The  compilation,  how- 
ever, is  the  work  of  a canon  of  Strasburg, 
John  Huttich  (born  about  1480;  died,  1544), 
but  the  labor  of  revision  fell  on  Grynaeus.5 6 *  It 
has  the  first  three  voyages  of  Columbus,  and 
those  of  Pinzon  and  Vespucius  ; the  rest  of  the 
book  is  taken  up  with  the  travels  of  Marco 
Polo  and  his  successors  to  the  East.8  It 


1 Fac-simile  of  cut  in  Reusner’s  leones  (Strasburg,  1590),  p.  107. 

2 Brunet,  i.  294;  Harrisse,  Notes  on  Columbus , p.  10;  Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  160;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i. 
no.  93 ; Sunderland,  vol.  iv.  no.  8,174,  (£61).  There  is  also  a copy  in  Harvard  College  Library. 

3 Sabin,  i.  200.  Copy  in  Harvard  College  Library ; it  was  printed  at  the  Elzevir  Press  (Harrisse,  Notes 
on  Columbus , p.  11 ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  no.  1,036;  Sunderland,  vol.  iv.  no.  8,175). 

4 Prescott’s  copy  is  in  Harvard  College  Library  ( Ferdinand  and  Isabella , 1873,  ii.  76). 

6 Cf.  Arana,  Bibliog.  de  obras  anon.  (1882),  no.  373. 

6 There  are  copies  of  this  Basle  edition  in  the  Boston  Public,  Harvard  College,  Carter-Brown,  Lenox, 

Astor,  and  Barlow  libraries.  Munster’ , map,  of  which  an  account  is  given  elsewhere,  is  often  wanting ; the 
price  for  a copy  with  the  map  has  risen  from  a guinea  in  Rich’s  day  (1832),  to  .£5.  Cf.  Harrisse,  no.  171  ; 
Leclerc.  no.  41 1 ; Muller  (1877),  no.  1,301 ; Ternaux,  no.  38;  Sabin,  vol.  ix.  no.  34,100;  Court,  no.  249.  The 

Paris  edition  has  the  Orontius  Finsus  map  properly,  though  others  are  sometimes  found  in  it.  Cf.  Harrisse, 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA. 


xxv 


next  appeared  in  a German  translation  at  Stras- 
burg  in  1534,  which  was  made  by  Michal  Herr, 
Die  New  IVelt.  It  has  no  map,  gives  more  from 
Martyr  than  the  other  edition,  and  substitutes 
a preface  by  Herr  for  that  of  Grynseus.1  The 
original  Latin  was  reproduced  at  Basle  again  in 
1 537,  with  1536  in  the  colophon.2  In  1555 
another  edition  was  printed  at  Basle,  enlarged 
upon  the  1537  edition  by  the  insertion  of  the 
second  and  third  of  the  Cortes  letters  and  some 
accounts  of  efforts  in  converting  the  Indians.3 
Those  portions  relating  to  America  exclusively 
were  reprinted  in  the  Latin  at  Rotterdam  in 
1616.4 

Sebastian  Munster,  who  was  born  in  1489, 
was  forty-three'  years  old  when  his  map  of  the 
world  — which  is  preserved  in  the  Paris  (1532) 
edition  of  the  Ncrvus  orbis  — appeared.  This  is 


the  first  time  that  Munster  significantly  comes 
before  us  as  a describer  of  the  geography  of  the 
New  World.  Again  in  1540  and  1542  he  was  as- 
sociated with  the  editions  of  Ptolemy  issued  at 
Basle  in  those  years.5  It  is,  however,  upon  his 
Cosmographia,  among  his  forty  books,  that  Mun- 
ster’s fame  chiefly  rests.  The  earliest  editions 
are  extremely  rare,  and  seem  not  to  be  clearly 
defined  by  the  bibliographers.  It  appears  to 
have  been  originally  issued  in  German,  probably 
in  1 544  at  Basle,6  under  the  mixed  title  : Cosmo- 
graphia.  Beschreibug  alter  lender  Durch  Sebas- 
tianum  Munsterum.  Getruckt  zii  Basel  durch 
Henrichum  Petri,  Anno  MDxliiij.'1  He  says 
that  he  had  been  engaged  upon  it  for  eighteen 
years,  keeping  Strabo  before  him  as  a model. 
To  the  section  devoted  to  Asia  he  adds  a 
few  pages  “Von  den  neiiwen  inseln  ” (folios 


nos.  172,  173;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  102;  Sabin,  vol.  ix.  nos.  34,101,  34,102;  Leclerc,  nos.  412  (150  francs), 
2,769;  Stevens,  Bibliotheca  gcographica,  p.  124;  Cooke,  no.  2,879;  Court,  no.  250;  Sunderland,  no.  263; 
Muller  (1872),  no.  1,847;  Quaritch  (1883)  £12  16 s.  The  Lenox  Library  has  copies  of  different  imprints, — 
“apud  Galeotum  ” and  “ apud  Parvum.”  There  are  other  copies  in  the  Barlow  and  Carter-Brown  libraries. 
Good  copies  are  worth  about  £10. 

1 Sabin  (vol.  ix.  p.  30)  says  it  is  rarer  than  the  original  Latin.  There  are  copies  in  Harvard  College, 
Congressional,  and  Carter-Brown  libraries.  Cf.  Rich  (1832),  £1  is.-,  Temaux,  no.  45;  Sabin,  vol.  ix. 
no.  34,106;  Grenville,  p.  498;  Harrisse,  no.  188,  with  references;  Stevens  (1870),  no.  1,419;  Muller  (1S72), 
no.  1,853,  and  ( 1877)  no.  1,309  (40  florins),  with  corrections  of  Harrisse;  Sobolewski,  no.  3,857;  Carter- 
Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  no;  Huth,  vol.  iii.  nos  1,050-1,051.  Quaritch  and  others  of  late  price  it  at  £3.  It 
was  from  this  German  edition  of  the  Ncrvus  orbis  that  the  collection,  often  quoted  as  that  of  Comelis 
Albyn,  and  called  Nicuiuc  Wcerelt , was  made  up  in  1563,  with  some  additional  matter.  It  is  in  the  dialect  of 
Brabant,  and  Muller  {Books  on  America,  1872,  no.  1,854)  says  it  is  “exceedingly  rare,  even  in  Holland;”  he 
prices  it  at  50  florins.  Cf.  Leclerc,  no.  2,579  (250  francs);  Sabin,  vol.  ix.  no.  34,107;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i. 
no.  240;  Huth,  vol.  iii.  no.  1,051  ; A.  R.  Smith’s  Catalogue  (1S74),  no.  8 (£2  2S-)  ; Pinart,  no.  668. 

2 It  has  pp.  585-600  in  addition  to  the  edition  of  1532.  There  are  copies  in  the  Cornell  University  [Sparks 
Catalogue,  no.  1,107),  Lenox,  Carter-Brown,  Barlow,  J.  C.  Brevoort,  and  American  Antiquarian  Society  libra- 
ries. One  of  the  two  copies  in  Harvard  College  Library  belonged  at  different  times  to  Charles  Sumner,  E.  A. 
Crowninshield  (no.  796),  and  the  poet  Thomas  Gray,  and  has  Gray’s  annotations,  and  a record  that  it  cost  him 
one  shilling  and  ninepence.  The  map  of  the  1532  Basle  edition  belongs  to  this  1537  edition ; but  it  is  often 
wanting.  The  Huth  Catalogue  (vol.  iii.  p.  1050)  calls  the  map  of  “extreme  rarity;  ” and  Quaritch  has  pointed 
out  that  the  larger  names  in  the  map  being  set  in  type  in  the  block,  there  is  some  variation  in  the  style  of  these 
inscriptions  belonging  to  the  different  issues.  Cf.  Sabin,  vol.  ix.  no.  34,103  ; Harrisse,  no.  223  ; Carter-Brown, 
vol.  i.  no.  123;  Leclerc,  no.  413,  with  map  (100  francs);  Stevens  ( Nuggets ) does  not  mention  the  map,  but 
his  Bibliotheca  historica  (1870),  no.  1,455,  and  Historical  Collections,  p.  66,  give  it;  Muller  (1872),  no.  1,850  and 
(1877)  no.  1,306.  Recent  prices  of  good  copies  with  the  map  are  quoted  at  £4  45.,  57  marks,  and  70  francs; 
without  the  map  it  brings  about  S 4.00.  Grolier’s  copy  was  in  the  Beckford  sale  (1882),  no.  187. 

3 There  are  copies  in  the  Boston  Public  (two  copies),  Boston  Athenaeum,  Harvard  College,  Carter-Brown 
(no.  202),  and  American  Antiquarian  Society  libraries.  The  map  is  repeated  from  the  earlier  Basle  editions. 
Cf.  Brinlcy  Catalogue,  no.  50;  Huth  Catalogue  (without  map),  iii.  1,050;  Harrisse,  no.  171  ; Stevens, 
Historical  Collection,  vol.  i.  no.  501  ; Cooke,  no.  1,064;  Sabin,  vol.  ix.  no.  34,104.  Rich,  in  1S32,  priced  it 
with  map  at  £2  2 s. ; recent  prices  are  £4  4,?.  and  £5  5 i. 

4 Edited  by  Balthazar  Lydius.  Cf.  Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  no.  1S2  ; Graesse,  iv.  699;  Brunet,  iv.  132; 
Sabin,  vol.  ix.  no.  34,105  ; Huth,  iii.  1051  ; Leclerc.  no.  414  (40  francs);  Stevens,  Nuggets,  £2  2 s.\  Court, 
no.  251  ; Muller  (1872),  no.  1,870.  There  are  copies  in  Harvard  College  Library  and  Boston  Athenaeum. 

6 The  editions  of  Ptolemy  recording  or  affecting  the  progress  of  geography  in  respect  to  the  New  World 
are  noted  severally  elsewhere  in  the  present  work ; but  the  whole  series  is  viewed  together  in  the  Bibliography 
of  Ptolemy's  Geography,  by  Justin  Winsor,  which,  after  appearing  serially  in  the  Harvard  University  Bulletin, 
was  issued  separately  by  the  University  Library  in  1S84  as  no.  iS  of  its  Bibliographical  Contributions. 

6 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Mexico,  i.  258.  Harrisse  (Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  237)  gives  the  date  1541  as  apparently 
the  first  edition.  His  authority  is  the  Labanoff  Catalogue ; but  the  date  therein  is  probably  an  error  (Sabin, 
vol.  xii.  no.  51,384).  The  Athena:  Rauricce  cites  a Latin  edition  of  1543,  — it  is  supposed  without  warrant, 
though  it  is  also  mentioned  in  Poggendorff’s  Biog.-liter.  Handworterbuch,  ii.  234. 

7 Harrisse  (Bibl.  Amer.  Vet.,  no.  258),  describing  a copy  in  the  Lenox  Library.  The  map  of  America  in 
this  edition  is  given  by  Santarem,  and  much  reduced  in  Lelewel.  There  are  twenty-four  maps  in  it  in  all  (Sabin, 
vol.  xii.  no.  51,385). 


XXVI 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


MUNSTER.1 

dcxxxv-dcxlij).  This  account  was  scant;  and  through  subsequent  editions,  and  was  confined 
though  it  was  a little  enlarged  in  the  second  to  ten  pages  in  that  of  1614.  The  last  of  the 
edition  in  1545,' 2 it  remained  of  smali  extent  German  editions  appeared  in  1628. 3 The  earliest 

1 Fac-simile  of  the  cut  in  the  Ptolemy  of  1552. 

3 Also  published  at  Basle  (Harrisse,  Bib/.  Amer.  Vet.,  Additions,  no.  152 ; Weigel,  1877,  Catalogue ; Sabin, 
vol.  xii.  no.  51,386).  It  has  twenty-eight  maps.  There  is  a copy  in  the  Royal  Library  at  Munich. 

3 The  third  and  later  German  editions  were  as  follows:  1546.  According  to  the  Athena  Rauricee.  — 1550. 
Basle,  1,233  pages,  woodcuts,  with  views  of  towns  added  for  the  first  time,  and  fourteen  folios  of  maps.  Har- 
risse (no.  294)  quotes  the  description  in  Ebert’s  Dictiotiary,  no.  14,500.  Cf.  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  51,387; 
Leclerc,  no.  396;  Rosenthal  (Munich,  1884),  no.  52,  at  80  marks.  Harrisse  ( Additions , no.  179)  says  the 
Royal  Library  at  Munich  has  three  different  German  editions  of  1550.  — 1553.  Basle.  Muller  ( Books  on 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA.  xxvii 

SEBA1TIANVS  HVNSTERVS 


Cofxnographus. 


Sat  lingua  fuer at  fontes  mibi  trader e fancla: 
Scnbtxe [e&munii  meiuuat  hijloriam. 

M.  D*  LII. 


MUNSTER.1 


undoubted  Latin  text2  appeared  at  Basle  in  by  Manuel  Deutsch,  which  were  given  in  the 
155°,  with  the  same  series  of  new  views,  etc.,  German  edition  of  that  date.3  With  nothing 

America,  1872,  no.  1,020 ; 1877,  no.  2,203)  cites  a copy,  with  twenty-six  maps ; also  Sabin  (vol.  xii.  no.  51,38s).  — 
1556.  Cited  by  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  53,389.  — 1561.  Basle.  Cf.  Rosenthal,  Catalogue  (1884),  no.  53.  — 1564. 
Basle.  Cf.  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  51,390;  Carter-Brown  Catalogue,  i.  598.  It  has  fourteen  maps,  the  last  being 
of  the  New  World.  — 1569,  1574,  1578.  Basle.  All  are  cited  by  Ebert  and  Harrisse,  who  give  them  twenty- 
six  maps,  and  say  that  the  cuts  are  poor  impressions.  — 1574,  1578,  1588.  Undated;  but  cited  by  Sabin, 
vol.  xii.  no.  51,391-51,393-  — 1 592,  1598.  In  these  editions  the  twenty-six  maps  and  the  woodcuts  are 


1 Fac-simile  of  a cut  in  Reusner’s  leones  (Strasburg,  1590),  p.  171. 

2 The  Athence  Rauricce  gives  a Latin  edition  of  1545. 

3 This  1550  Latin  edition  has  fourteen  maps,  and  copies  are  worth  from  $12  to  $15.  Cf.  Bibl.  Amer. 
Vet.,  no.  300;  //uth  Catalogue,  iii.  1,009;  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  51,379;  Strutt,  Dictionary  of  Engravers. 


xxviii  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


but  a change  of  title  apparently,  there  were 
reissues  of  this  edition  in  1551,  1552,  and  1554, 1 
and  again  in  15  59.2  The  edition  of  1572  has 
the  same  map,  “Novae  insulae,”  used  in  the  1554 
editions ; but  new  names  are  added,  and  new 
plates  of  Cusco  and  Cuba  are  also  furnished.3 

The  earliest  French  edition,  according  to  Bru- 
net,4 appeared  in  1552;  and  other  editions  fol- 
lowed in  that  language.6  Eden  gave  the  fifth 
book  an  English  dress  in  1553,  which  was  again 
issued  in  1572  and  1574.®  A Bohemian  edition, 
made  by  Jan  z Puchovva,  Kozin ograffia  Czieskd, 
was  issued  in  1 554.1  The  first  Italian  edition 


was  printed  at  Basle  in  1558,  using  the  engraved 
plates  of  the  other  Basle  issues ; and  finally,  in 
1575,  an  Italian  edition,  according  to  Brunet,8 
appeared  at  Co'onia. 

The  best-known  collection  of  voyages  of  the 
sixteenth  century  is  that  of  Ramusio,  whose 
third  volume  — compiled  probably  in  1553,  and 
printed  in  1556 — is  given  exclusively  to  Amer- 
ican voyages.9  It  contains,  however,  little  re- 
garding Columbus  not  given  by  Peter  Martyr 
and  Oviedo,  except  the  letter  to  Fracastoro.10 
In  Ramusio  the  narratives  of  these  early  voy- 
ages first  got  a careful  and  considerate  editor, 


engraved  after  new  drawings.  That  of  1592  is  in  the  Boston  Athenaeum  ; that  of  1598  is  in  Harvard  College 
Library.  The  likeness  of  Munster  on  the  title  is  inscribed : “ Seins  alters  lx  jar.”  America  is  shown  in  the 
general  mappemonde,  and  in  map  no.  xxvi.,  “Die  Newe  Welt.”  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  51,394-51,395.  — 1614, 
1628.  These  Basle  editions  reproduced  the  engravings  of  the  1592  and  1598  editions,  and  are  considered 
the  completest  issues  of  the  German  text.  They  are  worth  from  30  to  40  marks  each.  Sabin,  vol.  xii. 
no.  51,396. 

1 The  title  of  the  1554  edition  as  shown  in  the  copy  in  the  Boston  Public  Library  reads  as  follows  : Cosmo 
| graphiae  | uniuersalis  Lib.  VI.  in  \ quibus  inxta  certioris  fidei  scriptornm  \ traditioncm  describuntur , | 

Omnium  habitabilis  orbis  partium  situs,  pro-  | pricsq'  dotes.  \ Regionum  Topographiccs  effigies.  \ Terrs 
ingenia,  quibus  sit  ut  tam  differentes  &>  ua  | rias  specie  res,  &=  animalas,  &=  inanimatas,  ferat.  | Animalium 
peregrinorum  natures  pictures.  | Nobiliorum  ciuitatum  icones  &•  descriptions.  | Regnorum  initia , incre- 
ments & translations.  | Regum  &=  principum  genealogies.  \ Item  omnium  gentium  mores,  leges,  religio,  mu-  \ 
tationes : atq ’ memorabilium  in  hunc  usque  an-  | num  1554.  gestarum  rerum  Historia.  | Autore  Sebast.  Mun- 
stero.  The  same  edition  is  in  the  Harvard  College  Library ; but  the  title  varies,  and  reads  thus : Cosmo  \ 
graphics  | uniuersalis  Lib.  VI.  in  \ quibus , iuxta  certioris  fidei  scriptorum  | traditioncm  describuntur,  | 
Omniii  habitabilis  orbis  partiu  situs,  propriesq'  dotes.  \ Regionum  Topographices  effigies.  | Terrce  ingenia , 
quibus  sit  ut  tam  differentes  uarias  \ specie  res,  dr>  animatas  inanimatas,  ferat.  \ Animalium  peregri- 
norum natures  6°  pictures.  \ Nobiliorum  ciuitatum  icones  & descripliones.  \ Regnorum  initia,  incrementa 
translations . | Omnium  gentium  mores,  leges,  religio,  res  gestes,  mu-  \ tationes:  Item  regum  & principum 
genealogies.  | Autore  Sebast.  Munstero.  | The  colophon  in  both  reads:  ] Basilees  Apvd  Henrichvm  Petri,  | 
Mense  Septemb.  Anno  Sa  \ Ivtis  M.D.LIIII.  | This  copy  belonged  to  Dr.  Mather  Byles,  and  has  his  auto- 
graph ; the  title  is  mounted,  and  may  have  belonged  to  some  other  one  of  the  several  “ title-editions  ” which 

appeared  about  this  time.  Cf.  Harvard  University  Bulletin,  ii.  285  ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  194;  Sabin, 

vol.  xii.  no.  51,380-51,381.  The  account  of  America  is  on  pages  1,099-1,113.  These  editions  have  been  bought 
of  late  years  for  about  $4;  but  Rosenthal  (Munich,  1884)  prices  a copy  of  1552  at  130  marks,  and  one  of  1554 
at  150  marks. 

2 Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  51,382;  Muller,  Books  on,  America  (1872),  p.  11. 

3 Some  copies  have  nineteen  maps,  others  twenty-two  in  all.  Cf.  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  291;  Sabin, 

vol.  xii.  no.  51,383.  Some  passages  displeasing  to  the  Catholics  are  said  to  have  been  omitted  in  this  edition. 
It  is  worth  about  $12  or  $15. 

4 Supplement,  col.  1,129;  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  51,397. 

6 That  of  Basle,  1556,  has  on  pp.  1,353-1,374,  “ Des  nouvelles  ilsles:  comment,  quand  et  par  qui  elles  ont 
este  trouvees,”  with  a map  and  fourteen  woodcuts.  It  is  usually  priced  at  about  $20 ; the  copies  are  commonly 
worn  (Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  51,398).  The  same  publisher,  Henry  Pierre,  reissued  it  (without  date)  in  1568,  with 
twelve  folding  woodcut  maps,  the  first  of  which  pertains  to  America  (Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  271  ; Sabin, 
vol.  xii.  no.  51,399).  7n  1575  a new  French  edition,  with  the  cuts  reduced,  was  issued  in  three  volumes,  folio, 
edited  by  Belleforest  and  others;  it  gives  101  pages  to  America.  Cf.  Brunet,  col.  1,945;  Supplement, 
col.  1,129;  Stevens  (1870),  p.  121  ; Sunderland,  no.  8,722  (£18  ior.);  Porquet  (1884),  no.  1,673,  (,5°  francs), 
Sabin,  vol.  xii.  no.  51,400. 

6 Cf.  Vol.  III.  of  the  present  History,  pp.  200,  201. 

7 Weigel  (1877),  p.  96;  Sabin,  vol.  xii.  nc.  51,401. 

3 Supplement , col.  1,129.  Cf.  also  Weigel  (1877),  p.  96;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  no.  1,132  ; Sabin,  vol.  xii. 
nos.  51,402-51,403. 

9 Terzo  volume  delle  navigationi  et  viaggi,  etc.,  Venice,  1556.  His  name  is,  Latinized,  Ramusius. 

19  Harrisse,  Notes  on  Columbus,  p.  46.  A list  of  the  Contents  is  given  in  the  Carter-Brown  Catalogue 
(vol.  i.  p.  181),  and  in  Leclerc  (no.  484),  where  a set  (1554,  1583,  1565)  is  priced  at  250  francs.  Of  interest  in 
connection  with  the  present  History,  there  are  in  the  first  volume  of  Ramusio  the  voyages  of  Da  Gama,  Ves- 
pucius,  and  Magellan,  as  well  as  matter  of  interest  in  connection  with  Cabot  (see  Vol.  III.  p.  24) ; in  the  second 
volume  (1559),  the  travels  of  Marco  Polo,  the  voyage  of  the  Zeni  and  of  Cabot.  The  first  edition  of  the  first 
volume  was  published  in  1550;  Ramusio’s  name  does  not  appear.  A second  edition  came  out  in  1554.  Cf. 
Murphy  Catalogue , nos.  2,096-2,098  ; Cooke,  no.  2,117. 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA. 


XXIX 


who  at  this  time  was  ripe  in  knowledge  and 
experience,  for  he  was  well  beyond  sixty,1  and 
he  had  given  his  maturer  years  to  historical 
and  geographical  study.  He  had  at  one  time 
maintained  a school  for  topograph- 
ical studies  in  his  own  house. 

Oviedo  tells  us  of  the  assistance 
Ramusio  was  to  him  in  his  work. 

Locke  has  praised  his  labors  with- 
out stint.2 * 

Monardes,  one  of  the  distin- 
guished Spanish  physicians  of  this 
time,  was  busy  seeking  for  the  sim- 
ples and  curatives  of  the  New' 

World  plants,  as  the  adventurers  to 
New  Spain  brought  them  back.  The 
original  issue  of  his  work  was  the 
Dos  Libros,  published  at  Seville  in 
1 565,  treating  “ of  all  things  brought 
from  our  West  Indies  which  are 
used  in  medicine,  and  of  the  Be- 
zaar  Stone,  and  the  herb  Escuer- 
^onera.”  This  book  is  become  rare, 
and  is  priced  as  high  as  200  francs 
and  The  “segunda  parte  ” is 

sometimes  found  separately  with  the 
date  1571 ; but  in  1574  a third  part 
was  printed  with  the  other  two,  — 
making  the  complete  work,  Historia 
medicinal  de  nuestras  Indias,  — and 
these  were  again  issued  in  1580.4 * 
An  Italian  version,  by  Annibale  Bri- 
gand, appeared  at  Venice  in  1575 
and  1 589,°  and  a French,  with  Du 
Jardin,  in  1602.6 7  There  were  three 
English  editions  printed  under  the 
title  of  Joyfidl  Ncwes  out  of  the  newe 
founde  world,  wherein  is  declared 
the  rare  and  singular  virtues  of  di- 
verse and  sundry  Herbes,  Trees,  Oyles,  Plantes , 
and  Stones,  by  Doctor  Monardus  of  Scvill,  Eng- 
lished by  John  Frampton,  which  first  appeared 
in  1577,  and  was  reprinted  in  1580,  with  addi- 


tions from  Monardes’  other  tracts,  and  again  in 
1596.1 

The  Spanish  historians  of  affairs  in  Mexico, 
Peru,  and  Florida  are  grouped  in  the  Hispani- 


MONARDES. 

carum  rerum  scriptores,  published  at  Frankfort 
in  1579-1581,  in  three  volumes.8  Of  Richard 
Hakluyt  and  his  several  collections,  — the  Divers 
Voyages  of  1582,  the  Principall  Navigations  of 


1 Born  in  1485-1486;  died  in  1557.  There  is  an  alleged  portrait  of  Ramusio  in  the  new  edition  of  II 
viaggio  di  Giovan  Leone,  etc.  (Venice,  1S57),  the  only  volume  of  it  published.  The  portrait  of  him  by  Paul 
Veronese  in  the  hall  of  the  Great  Council  was  burned  in  1557  ; and  Cicogna  ( Bibliotcca  Vcncziana,  ii.  310) 
says  that  the  likeness  now  in  the  Sala  dello  Scudo  is  imaginary. 

2 Cf.  also  Camus,  Memoirc  sur  De  Bry,  p.  8;  Humboldt,  Examen  critique;  Hallam,  Literature  of 
Europe;  Harrisse,  Bill.  Amcr.  Vet.,  no.  304;  Brunet,  vol.  iv.  col.  1100;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  195; 
Clarke’s  Maritime  Discovery,  p.  x,  where  Tiraboschi’s  account  of  Ramusio  is  translated ; and  H.  H.  Bancroft, 
Mexico,  i.  282.  Ternaux  mentions  a second  edition  in  1564;  but  Harrisse  could  find  no  evidence  of  it  ( Bill. 
Amcr.  Vet.,  p.  xxxiii).  There  was  a well-known  second  edition  of  the  third  volume  in  1565  (differing  in  title 
only  from  the  1556  edition),  which,  with  a first  volume  of  15S8  and  a second  volume  of  1583,  is  thought  to  make 
up  the  most  desirable  copy  ; though  there  are  some  qualifications  in  the  case,  since  the  1606  edition  of  the  third 
volume  is  really  more  complete. 

8 Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  275. 

4 Cf.  Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  nos.  287,  288,  299,  337;  Sunderland,  nos.  8,569,  8,570;  Brinley,  no.  44  ; Mur- 

phy, no.  1,709  ; Court,  no.  241. 

6 Court,  no.  242. 

8 Carter-Brown,  i.  386;  ii.  12  ; Brinley,  no.  45. 

7 The  different  editions  in  the  various  languages  are  given  in  Sabin,  xii.  282. 

8 Sabin,  vol.  viii.  no.  32,004. 


XXX 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


1589,  and  his  enlarged  edition,  of  which  the 
third  volume  (1600)  relates  to  America,  — there 
is  an  account  in  Vol.  III.  of  the  present  work.1 2 

The  great  undertaking  of  De  Bry  was  also 
begun  towards  the  close  of  the  same  century. 


De  Bry  was  an  engraver  at  Frankfort,  and  his 
professional  labors  had  made  him  acquainted 
with  works  of  travel.  The  influence  of  Hakluyt 
and  a visit  to  the  English  editor  stimulated 
him  to  undertake  a task  similar  to  that  of 


1 This  follows  a print  given  in  fac-simile  in  the  Carter-Brown  Catalogue , i.  316. 

2 A complete  reprint  of  all  of  Hakluyt’s  publications,  in  fourteen  or  fifteen  volumes,  is  announced  (1884)  by 
E.  and  G.  Goldsmid,  of  Edinburgh. 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA. 


xxxi 


FEYERABEND.1 2 


the  English  compiler.  He  resolved  to  in- 
clude both  the  Old  and  New  World  ; and 
he  finally  produced  his  volumes  simultaneously 
in  Latin  and  German.  As  he  gave  a larger 
size  to  the  American  parts  than  to  the  others, 
the  commonly  used  title,  referring  to  this  differ- 
ence, was  soon  established  as  Grands  et  petits 
voyages?  Theodore  De  Bry  himself  died  in 
March,  1598;  but  the  work  was  carried  forward 
by  his  widow,  by  his  sons  John  Theodore  and 
John  Israel,  and  by  his  sons-in-law  Matthew 


Merian  and  William  Fitzer.  The  task  was  not 
finished  till  1634,  when  twenty-five  parts  had 
been  printed  in  the  Latin,  of  which  thirteen  per- 
tain to  America  ; but  the  German  has  one  more 
part  in  the  American  series.  His  first  part  — 
which  was  Hariot’s  Virginia  — was  printed  not 
only  in  Latin  and  German,  but  also  in  the 
original  English 3 and  in  French  ; but  there 
seeming  to  be  no  adequate  demand  in  these 
languages,  the  subsequent  issues  were  confined 
to  Latin  and  German.  There  was  a gap  in  the 


1 Sigmund  Feyerabend  was  a prominent  bookseller  of  his  day  in  Frankfort,  and  was  born  about  1527  or 
1528.  He  was  an  engraver  himself,  and  was  associated  with  De  Bry  in  the  publications  of  his  Voyages. 

2 The  title,  however,  as  given  in  catalogues  generally,  runs  : Collectiones  pcregrinationum  in  Indiam 
oricntalem  et  Indiam  occidentalem,  XXV  partibus  comprehensce  a Thcodoro,  Joan-Theodoro  De  Bry , 
et  a Mathco  Merian  publicatcc.  Francofurti  ad  Mcenum,  1590-1634. 

* This  part  is  of  extreme  rarity,  and  Dibdin  says  that  Lord  Oxford  bought  the  copy  in  the  Grenville  Library 
in  1740  for  .£140.  Cf.  Vol.  III.  p.  123. 


XXX11 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


dates  of  publication  between  1600  (when  the 
ninth  part  is  called  “postrema  pars  ”)  and  1619 
-1620,  when  the  tenth  and  eleventh  parts  ap- 
peared at  Oppenheim,  and  a twelfth  at  Frank- 
fort in  1624.  A thirteenth  and  fourteenth  part 
appeared  in  German  in  1628  and  1630 ; and 
these,  translated  together  into  Latin,  completed 
the  Latin  series  in  1634. 

Without  attempting  any  bibliographical  de- 
scription,1 the  succession  and  editions  of  the 
American  parts  will  be  briefly  enumerated  : — 

X.  Hariot's  Virginia.  In  Latin,  English,  German, 
and  French,  in  1590;  four  or  more  impressions  of  the 
Latin  the  same  year.  Other  editions  of  the  German  in 
1600  and  1620. 

II.  Le  Moyne's  Florida.  In  Latin,  1591  and  1609;  in 
German,  1591,  1603. 

III.  Von  Staden' s Brazil.  In  Latin,  1592,  1605,  1630; 
in  German,  1593  (twice). 

IV.  Benzoni' s New  World.  In  Latin,  1594  (twice), 
1644;  in  German,  1594,  1613. 

V.  Continuation  0/ Benzoni.  In  Latin,  1595  (twice);  in 
German,  two  editions  without  date,  probably  1595  and  1613. 

VI.  Continuation  of  Benzoni  ( Peru ).  In  Latin,  1596, 
1597,  i6t7;  in  German,  1597,  1619. 


VII.  Sckmidel’s  Brazil.  In  Latin,  1599,  1625 ; in 
German,  1597,  1600,  1617. 

VIII.  Drake,  Candish,  and  Ralegh.  In  Latin,  1599 
(twice),  1625  ; in  German,  1599,  1624. 

IX.  Acosta,  etc.  n Latin,  1602,  1633;  in  German, 
probably  1601;  “ additamentum,”  1602;  and  again  entire 
after  1620. 

X.  V espucius,  Hamor,  and  John  Smith.  In  Latin, 
1619  (twice);  in  German,  1618. 

XI.  Schouten  and  Spilbergen.  In  Latin,  1619,  — ap- 
pendix, 1620;  in  German,  1619,  — appendix,  1620. 

XII.  Herrera.  In  Latin,  1624;  in  German,  1623. 

XIII.  Miscellaneous,  — Cabot , etc.  In  Latin,  1634; 
in  German,  the  first  seven  sections  in  1627  (sometimes 
1628);  and  sections  8-15  in  1630. 

Elenchus : Historia  America  sive  Novus  orbis,  1634 
(three  issues).  This  is  a table  of  the  Contents  to  the  edition 
which  Merian  was  selling  in  1634  under  a collective  title. 

The  foregoing  enumeration  makes  no  recog- 
nition of  the  almost  innumerable  varieties  caused 
by  combination,  which  sometimes  pass  for  new 
editions.  Some  of  the  editions  of  the  same  date 
are  usually  called  “ counterfeits  ; ” and  there  are 
doubts,  even,  if  some  of  those  here  named  really 
deserve  recognition  as  distinct  editions.2 


1 The  earliest  description  of  a set  of  De  Bry  of  any  bibliographical  moment  is  that  of  the  Abbe  de 
Rothelin,  Observations  et  details  sur  la  collection  des  voyages , etc.  (Paris,  1742),  pp.  44  (Carter-Brown,  vol.  i. 
no.  473),  which  is  reprinted  in  Lenglet  du  Fresnoy’s  Methode  pour  etudier  la  geographic  (1768),  i.  324. 
Gabriel  Martin,  in  his  catalogue  of  the  library  of  M.  Cisternay  du  Fay,  had  somewhat  earlier  announced  that 
collector’s  triumph  in  calling  a set  in  his  catalogue  (no.  2,825)  “cxemplum  omni  genere  perfectum,”  when  his 
copy  brought  450  francs.  The  Abbe  de  Rothelin  aimed  to  exceed  Cisternay  du  Fay,  and  did  in  the  varieties 
which  he  brought  together.  The  next  description  was  that  of  De  Bure  in  his  Bibliographic  instructive  (vol.  i. 
p.  67),  printed  1763-1768 ; but  the  German  editions  were  overlooked  by  De  Bure,  as  they  had  been  by  his  prede- 
cessors. The  Carter-Brown  Catalogue  (vol.  i.  no.  473)  shows  Sobolewski’s  copy  of  De  Bure  with  manuscript 
notes.  A lifetime  later,  in  1802,  A.  G.  Camus  printed  at  Paris  his  Memoire  sur  les  grands  et  petits  voyages 
[de  De  Bry]  et  les  voyages  de  Thevenot.  As  a careful  and  critical  piece  of  work,  this  collation  of  Camus  was 
superior  to  De  Bure’s.  A description  of  a copy  belonging  to  the  Duke  of  Bedford  was  printed  in  Paris  in  1836 
(6  pp.).  Weigel,  in  the  Serapeum  (1845),  PP-  65-89,  printed  his  “ Bibliographische  Mittheilungen  iiber  die 
deutschen  Ausgaben  von  De  Bry,”  which  was  also  printed  separately.  It  described  a copy  now  owned  in  New 
York.  Muller,  in  his  Catalogue  (1872),  p.  217,  indicates  some  differences  from  Weigel’s  collations.  The  copy 
formed  by  De  Bure  fell  into  Mr.  Grenville’s  hands,  and  was  largely  improved  by  him  before  he  left  it,  with 
his  library,  to  the  British  Museum.  The  Bibliotheca  Grenvilliana  describes  it,  and  Bartlett  (Carter-Brown 
Catalogue , i.  321)  thinks  it  the  finest  in  Europe.  Cf.  Dibdin’s  description,  which  is  copied  in  the  American 
Bibliopolist  (1872),  p.  13.  The  standard  collation  at  present  is  probably  that  of  Brunet,  in  his  Manuel 
du  libraire,  vol.  i.  (i860),  which  was  also  printed  separately  ; in  this  he  follows  Weigel  for  the  German  texts. 
This  account  is  followed  by  Sabin  in  his  Dictionary  (vol.  iii.  p.  20),  whose  article,  prepared  by  Charles  A. 
Cutter,  of  the  Boston  Athensum,  has  also  been  printed  separately.  The  Brunet  account  is  accompanied  by  a 
valuable  note  (also  in  Sabin,  iii.  59),  by  Sobolewski,  whose  best  set  (reaching  one  hundred  and  seventy  parts) 
was  a wonderful  one,  though  he  lacked  the  English  Hariot.  This  set  came  to  this  country  through  Muller 
(cf.  his  Catalogue , 1875,  P-  387))  and  is  now  in  the  Lenox  Library.  Sobolewski’s  second  set  went  into  the 
Field  Collection,  and  was  sold  in  1875  i and  again  in  the  J.  J.  Cooke  sale  ( Catalogue , iii.  297)  in  1883.  Cf. 
Catalogue  de  la  collection  de  feu  M.  Serge  Sobolewski  de  Moscou,  prepared  by  Albert  Cohn.  The  sale  took 
place  in  Leipsic  in  July,  1873.  Brunet  and  Sobolewski  both  point  out  the  great  difficulties  of  a satisfactory 
collation,  arising  from  the  publisher’s  habit  of  mixing  the  sheets  of  the  various  editions,  forming  varieties 
almost  beyond  the  acquisition  of  the  most  enthusiastic  collector,  “so  that,”  says  Brunet,  “perhaps  no  two 
copies  of  this  work  are  exactly  alike.”  “ No  man  ever  yet,”  says  Henry  Stevens  ( Historical  Collections , vol.  i. 
no.  179),  “ made  up  his  De  Bry  perfect,  if  one  may  count  on  the  three  great  De  Bry  witnesses,  — the  Right 
Honorable  Thomas  Grenville,  the  Russian  prince  Sobolewski,  and  the  American  Mr.  Lenox,  — who  all  went 
far  beyond  De  3ure,  yet  fell  far  short  of  attaining  all  the  variations  they  had  heard  of.”  The  collector  will 
value  various  other  collations  now  accessible,  like  that  in  the  Carter-Brown  Catalogue , vol.  i.  no.  396  (also 
printed  separately,  twenty-five  copies,  in  1875);  that  printed  by  Quaritch,  confined  to  the  German  texts;  that 
in  the  Huth  Catalogue,  ii.  404  ; and  that  in  t'.ie  Sunderland  Catalogue,  nos.  2,052,  2,053. 

2 There  are  lists  of  the  sets  which  have  been  sold  since  1709  given  in  Sabin  (vol.  iii.  p.  47),  from  Brunet,  and 
in  the  Carter-Brown  Catalogue  (vol.  i.  p.  408).  The  Rothelin  copy,  then  esteemed  the  best  known,  brought,  in 
1 746,  750  francs.  At  a later  day,  with  additions  secured  under  better  knowledge,  it  again  changed  hands  at  2, 5 5 1 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA.  xxxiii 


While  there  is  distinctive  merit  in  De  Bry’s 
collection,  which  caused  it  to  have  a due  effect 
in  its  day  on  the  progress  of  geographical 
knowledge,1  it  must  be  confessed  that  a certain 
meretricious  reputation  has  become  attached 
to  the  work  as  the  test  of  a collector’s  assi- 
duity, and  of  his  supply  of  money,  quite  dis- 
proportioned  to  the  relative  use  of  the  collection 
in  these  days  to  a student.  This  artificial  ap- 
preciation has  no  doubt  been  largely  due  to 
the  engravings,  which  form  so  attractive  a fea- 
ture in  the  series,  and  which,  while  they  in 
many  cases  are  the  honest  rendering  of  genuine 
sketches,  are  certainly  in  not  a few  the  merest 
fancy  of  some  designer.2 

There  are  several  publications  of  the  De 
Brys  sometimes  found  grouped  with  the  Voyages 
as  a part,  though  not  properly  so,  of  the  series. 
Such  are  Las  Casas’  Narratio  regionum  Indi- 
car um  ; the  voyages  of  the  “ Silberne  Welt,”  by 
Arthus  von  Dantzig,  and  of  Olivier  van  Noort  ;3 
the  Rerum  et  urbis  A mstelodamensium  historia 
of  Pontanus,  with  its  Dutch  voyages  to  the 
north  ; and  the  Navigations  aux  Indes  par  les 
Hollancfois .4 


Another  of  De  Bry’s  editors,  Gasper  Ens, 
published  in  1680  his  West-unnd-Ost  Indischer 
Lustgart,  which  is  a summary  of  the  sources 
of  American  history.5 

There  are  various  abridgments  of  De  Bry. 
The  earliest  is  Ziegler’s  America , Frankfort, 
1614, 6 which  is  made  up  from  the  first  nine 
parts  of  the  German  Grands  Voyages.  The 
Historia  anttpodum,  oder  Newe  Welt  (1631),  is 
the  first  twelve  parts  condensed  by  Johann 
Ludwig  Gottfried,  otherwise  known  as  Johann 
Phillippe  Abelin,  who  was,  in  Merian’s  day, 
a co-laborer  on  the  Voyages.  He  uses  a large 
number  of  the  plates  from  the  larger  work.7 
The  chief  rival  collection  of  De  Bry  is  that  of 
Hulsius,  which  is  described  elsewhere.8 

Collections  now  became  numerous.  Conrad 
Low’s  Meer  oder  Seehanen  Buck  was  published 
at  Cologne  in  1598.9  The  Dutch  Collection  of 
Voyages,  issued  by  Cornelius  Claesz,  appeared 
in  uniform  style  between  1598  and  1603,  but 
it  never  had  a collective  title.  It  gives  the 
voyages  of  Cavendish  and  Drake.19 

It  was  well  into  the  next  century  ( 1613)  when 
Purchas  began  his  publications,  of  which  there 


francs,  and  once  more,  in  1855  (described  in  the  Bulletin  du  bibliophile , 1855,  pp.  38-41),  Mr.  Lenox  bought 
it  for  12,000  francs  ; and  in  1873  Mr.  Lenox  also  bought  the  best  Sobolewski  copy  (fifty-five  volumes)  for  5,050 
thalers.  With  these  and  other  parts,  procured  elsewhere,  this  library  is  supposed  to  lead  all  others  in  the  facili- 
ties for  a De  Bry  bibliography.  Fair  copies  of  the  Grands  voyages  in  Latin,  in  first  or  second  editions,  are 
usually  sold  for  about  .£100,  and  for  both  voyages  for  £150,  and  sometimes  £200.  Muller,  in  1872,  held  the 
fourteen  parts,  in  German,  of  the  Grands  voyages,  at  1,000  florins.  Fragmentary  sets  are  frequently  in  the 
Catalogues,  but  bring  proportionately  much  less  prices.  In  unusually  full  sets  the  appreciation  of  value  is 
rapid  with  every  additional  part.  Most  large  American  libraries  have  sets  of  more  or  less  completeness. 
Besides  those  in  the  Carter-Brown  (which  took  thirty  years  to  make,  besides  a duplicate  set  from  the  Sobo- 
lewski sale)  and  Lenox  libraries,  there  are  others  in  the  Boston  Public,  Harvard  College,  Astor,  and  Long 
Island  Historical  Society  libraries,  — all  of  fair  proportions,  and  not  unfrequently  in  duplicate  and  complemental 
sets.  The  copy  of  the  Great  Voyages,  in  Latin  (all  first  editions),  in  the  Murphy  Library  ( Catalogue , no.  379), 
was  gathered  for  Mr.  Murphy  by  Obadiah  Rich.  The  Murphy  Library  also  contained  the  German  text  in  first 
editions.  In  1884  Quaritch  offered  the  fine  set  from  the  Hamilton  Library  (twenty-five  parts),  “presumed 
to  be  quite  perfect,”  for  £670.  The  Earl  of  Crawford  and  Balcarres  is  about  publishing  his  bibliography  of 
De  Bry. 

1 There  are  somewhat  diverse  views  on  this  point  expressed  by  Brunet  and  in  the  Grenville  Catalogue. 

2 Reference  has  been  made  elsewhere  (Vol.  III.  pp.  123,  164)  to  sketches,  now  preserved  as  a part  of  the 
Grenville  copy  of  De  Bry  in  the  British  Museum,  which  seem  to  have  been  the  originals  from  which  De  Bry 
engraved  the  pictures  in  Hariot’s  Virginia,  etc.  These  were  drawn  by  Wyth,  or  White.  A collection  of 
twenty-four  plates  of  such,  from  De  Bry,  were  published  in  New  York  in  1841  ( Field's  Indian  Bibliography, 
no.  1,701).  Cf.  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  Oct.  20,  1866,  for  other  of  De  Bry’s  drawings  in  the  British  Museum. 
De  Bry’s  engravings  have  been  since  copied  by  Picard  in  his  Ceremonies  et  coutumes  religieuses  dcs  peuples 
idolatrcs  (Amsterdam,  1 723),  and  by  others.  Exception  is  taken  to  the  fidelity  of  De  Bry’s  engravings  in  the 
parts  on  Columbus  ; cf.  Navarrete,  French  translation,  i.  320. 

3 Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  nos.  453,  454,  455. 

4 Rich  (1832),  £5  5 s.  Cf.  P.  A.  Tiele’s  Memoirc  bibliographique  sur  les  journaux  des  navigateurs 
Nccrlandais  reimprimes  dans  les  collections  de  De  Bry  et  de  Hulsius,  Amsterdam,  1867. 

3 Stevens  (1870),  no.  668  ; Sabin,  vi.  211. 

6 Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  456;  vol.  ii.  no.  198  ; Muller  (1875),  P-  3^9- 

7 Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  nos.  457,  458;  vol.  ii.  nos.  373,  791.  There  was  a second  edition  in  1655.  Cf. 
Muller  (1872),  no.  636;  Sabin,  vol.  i.  no.  50;  iii.  59;  Hath,  ii.  612.  Abelin  also  edited  the  first  four 
volumes  (covering  1617-1643)  of  the  Thcatrum  Europeum  (Frankfort,  1635),  etc.,  which  pertains  incidentally 
to  American  affairs  (Muller,  1872,  no.  1,514).  Fitzer’s  Orientalische  Indien  (1628)  and  Arthus’s  Historia 
Indite  orientalis  (1608)  are  abridgments  of  the  Small  Voyages. 

8 Vol.  IV.  p.  442. 

9 Sabin,  vol.  x.  no.  42,392  ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  i.  no.  530. 

10  Muller  (1872),  no.  1,867. 

VOL.  1.  — C 


XXXIV 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


is  an  account  elsewhere.1  Hieronymus  Megi- 
ser’s  Septentrio  novantiquus  was  published  at 
Leipsic  in  1613.  In  a single  volume  it  gave 
the  Zeni  and  later  accounts  of  the  North,  be- 
sides narratives  pertaining  to  New  France  and 
Virginia.2  The  Journalen  van  de  Reysen  op 
Oostindie  of  Michael  Colijn,  published  at  Am- 
sterdam in  1619,  is  called  by  Muller  3 the  first 
series  of  voyages  published  in  Dutch  with  a 
collective  title.  It  includes,  notwithstanding  the 
title,  Cavendish,  Drake,  and  Raleigh.  Another 
Dutch  folio,  Herckmans’  Der  Zeevaert  lof  etc. 
(Amsterdam,  1634),  does  not  include  any  Amer- 
ican voyages.4  The  celebrated  Dutch  collection, 
edited  by  Isaac  Commelin,  at  Amsterdam,  and 
known  as  the  Begin  en  Voortgangk  van  de  Oost- 
Indische  Cosnpagnie,  would  seem  originally  to 
have  included,  among  its  voyages  to  the  East 
and  North,5  those  of  Raleigh  and  Cavendish ; 
but  they  were  later  omitted.6 

The  collection  of  Thevenot  was  issued  in 
1663;  but  this  has  been  described  elsewhere.7 
The  collection  usually  cited  as  Dapper’s  was 
printed  at  Amsterdam,  1669-1729,  in  folio 
(thirteen  volumes).  It  has  no  collective  title, 
but  among  the  volumes  are  two  touching 
America,  — the  Beschrijvbige  of  Montanus,8  and 
Nienhof’s  Brasiliaansche  Zee-en  LantreizeP  A 
small  collection,  Recueil  de  divers  voyages  /aits 
en  Africa  et  en  P Ameriquef-  was  published 
in  Paris  by  Billaine  in  1674.  It  includes 
Blome’s  Jamaica,  Laborde  on  the  Caribs,  etc. 


Some  of  the  later  American  voyages  were  also 
printed  in  the  second  edition  of  a Swedish 
Reesa-book,  printed  at  Wysingzborg  in  1674, 
1675. 11  The  Italian  collection,  II  genio  va- 
gante,  was  printed  at  Parma  in  1691-1693,  in 
four  volumes. 

An  Account  of  Several  Voyages  (London,  1694) 
gives  Narborough’s  to  Magellan’s  Straits,  and 
Marten’s  to  Greenland. 

The  important  English  Collection  of  Voyages 
and  Travels  which  passes  under  the  name  of 
its  publisher,  Churchill,  took  its  earliest  form 
in  1704,  appearing  in  four  volumes;  but  was 
afterwards  increased  by  two  additional  volumes 
111  <733.  an<i  by  two  more  in  1744,  — these  last, 
sometimes  called  the  Oxford  Voyages,  - being 
made  up  from  material  in  the  library  of  the 
Earl  of  Oxford.  It  was  reissued  complete  in 
1752.  It  has  an  introductory  discourse  by 
Caleb  Locke  ; and  this,  and  some  other  of  its 
contents,  constitutes  the  Histoire  de  la  naviga- 
tion, Paris,  1722.12 

John  Harris,  an  English  divine,  had  com- 
piled a Collection  of  Voyages  in  1702  which  was 
a rival  of  Churchill’s,  differing  from  it  in  being 
an  historical  summary  of  all  voyages,  instead 
of  a collection  of  some.  Harris  wrote  the  In- 
troduction ; but  it  is  questionable  how  much 
else  he  had  to  do  with  it.13  It  was  revised  and 
reissued  in  1744-1748  by  Dr.  John  Campbell, 
and  in  this  form  it  is  often  regarded  as  a sup- 
plement to  Churchill.14  It  was  reprinted  in  two 


1 Vol.  III.  p.  47.  Cf.  Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  nos.  159,  169,  189,  223,  308,  330,  397.  Sobolewski’s  copy 
was  in  the  Menzies  sale  (no.  1,649).  Quaritch’s  price  is  from  £75  to  £100,  according  to  condition,  which  is 
the  price  of  good  copies  in  recent  sales. 

2 Muller  (1872),  no.  2,067. 

3 Catalogue  (1875),  no-  3j2§4  > f1 877),  no.  1,627  ; Tiele,  no.  1. 

4 Muller  (1872),  no.  1,837. 

6  This  collection  also  includes  the  voyages  of  Barentz,  and  of  Hudson,  as  well  as  several  through  Magellan’s 
Straits,  with  Madriga’s  voyage  to  Peru  and  Chili. 

6 The  collection,  as  it  is  known,  is  sometimes  dated  1644  and  1645,  but  usually  1646  (Muller,  1872, 
no.  1,871;  Tiele,  Memoire  bibliographique , p.  9;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  nos.  567,  586;  Sabin,  iv.  315,  316). 
A partial  English  translation  appeared  in  London  in  1703  (Muller,  1872,  no.  1,886).  The  Oost-Indische 
Voyagien,  issued  at  Amsterdam  in  1648  by  Joost  Hartgers,  is  a reprint  of  part  of  Commelin,  with  some  addi- 
tions. Only  one  volume  was  printed;  but  Muller  thinks  (1872  Catalogue,  no.  1877)  that  some  separate  issues 
(1649-1651),  including  Vries’s  voyage  to  Virginia  and  New  Netherland,  were  intended  to  make  part  of  a second 
volume.  Cf.  Sabin,  viii.  11S  ; Stevens,  Nuggets,  no.  1,339. 

7 Vol.  IV.  p.  219.  * 

8 The  original  of  Ogilby’s  America : cf.  Vol.  III.  p.  416. 

9 Muller  (1872),  no.  1,884.  Another  Dutch  publication,  deserving  of  a passing  notice,  which,  though  not  a 
collection  of  voyages,  enlarges  upon  the  heroes  of  such  voyages,  is  the  Lceven  en  Dadcn  der  doorluchtigste 
Zee-heldcn  (Amsterdam,  1676),  by  Lambert  van  den  Bos,  which  gives  accounts  of  Columbus,  Vespucius, 
Magellan,  Drake,  Cavendish,  the  Zeni,  Cabot,  Cortereal,  Frobisher,  and  Davis.  There  was  a German  trans- 
lation at  Nuremberg  in  1681  (Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  no.  1,149  ; Stevens,  1870,  no.  231). 

10  Carter-Brown,  vol.  ii.  no.  1,111.  A second  edition  was  printed  by  the  widow  Cellier  in  Paris  in  1683 
(Muller,  1875,  P-  395)t  containing  the  same  matter  differently  arranged. 

11  An  earlier  edition  (1667)  did  not  have  them  (Muller,  1875,  p.  394).  Capel’s  Vorstellungen  des  Norden 
(Hamburg,  1676)  summarizes  the  voyages  of  the  Zeni,  Hudson,  and  others  to  the  Arctic  regions. 

12  Sabin,  iv.  68 ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  50.  It  includes  in  the  later  editions  Castell’s  description  of 
America,  with  other  of  the  Harleian  manuscripts,  and  gives  Ferdinand  Columbus’  life  of  his  father. 

13  Historical  Magazine,  i.  125. 

14  Allibone  ; Bohn's  Lowndes , etc. 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA. 


XXXV 


volumes,  folio,  with  continuations  to  date,  in 
1764.1 

The  well-known  Dutch  collection  ( Voyagien ) 
of  Vander  Aa  was  printed  at  Leyden  in  1706, 
1707.  It  gives  voyages  to  all  parts  of  the  world 
made  between  1246  and  1693.  He  borrows  from 
Herrera,  Acosta,  Purchas,  De  Bry,  and  all  avail- 
able sources,  and  illuminates  the  whole  with 
about  five  hundred  maps  and  plates.  In  its 
original  form  it  made  twenty-eight,  sometimes 
thirty,  volumes  of  small  size,  in  black-letter, 
and  eight  volumes  in  folio,  both  editions  being 
issued  at  the  same  time  and  from  the  same  type. 
In  this  larger  form  the  voyages  are  arranged  by 
nations ; and  it  was  the  unsold  copies  of  this 
edition  which,  with  a new  general  title,  consti- 
tutes the  edition  of  1727.  In  the  smaller  form 
the  arrangement  is  chronological.  In  the  folio 
edition  the  voyages  to  Spanish  America  pre- 
vious to  1340  constitute  volumes  three  and  four  ; 
while  the  English  voyages,  to  1696,  are  in  vol- 
umes five  and  six.2 

In  1707  Du  Perier’s  Histoire  imiverselle  des 
voyages  had  not  so  wide  a scope  as  its  title  in- 
dicated, being  confined  to  the  early  Spanish 
voyages  to  America;3  the  proposed  subsequent 
volumes  not  having  been  printed.  An  English 
translation,  under  Du  Perier’s  name,  was  issued 
in  London  in  1708; 4 but  when  reissued  in  17 11, 
with  a different  title,  it  credited  the  authorship 
to  the  Abbe  Bellegarde.5 *  In  1711,  also,  Captain 
John  Stevens  published  in  London  his  New 
Collection  of  Voyages;  but  Lawson’s  Carolina 
and  Cieza’s  Peru  were  the  only  American  sec- 
tions.*’ In  1715  the  French  collection  known 
as  Bernard’s  Recucil  de  voiages  an  Nord , was 
begun  at  Amsterdam.  A pretty  wide  interpre- 
tation is  given  to  the  restricted  designation  of 


the  title,  and  voyages  to  California,  Louisiana, 
the  Upper  Mississippi  (Hennepin),  Virginia, 
and  Georgia  are  included.7  Daniel  Coxe,  in 
1741,  united  in  one  volume  A Collection  of  Voy- 
ages, three  of  which  he  had  already  printed 
separately,  including  Captain  James’s  to  the 
Northwest.  A single  volume  of  a collection 
called  The  American  Traveller  appeared  in 
London  in  1743.8 

The  collection  known  as  Astley’s  Voyages 
was  published  in  London  in  four  volumes  in 
1745-1747  ; the  editor  was  John  Green,  whose 
name  is  sometimes  attached  to  the  work.  It 
gives  the  travels  of  Marco  Polo,  but  has  noth- 
ing of  the  early  voyages  to  America,9  — these 
being  intended  for  later  volumes,  were  never 
printed.  These  four  volumes  were  translated, 
with  some  errors  and  omissions,  into  French, 
and  constitute  the  first  nine  volumes  of  the 
Abbe  Prevost’s  Histoire  generate  des  voyages, 
begun  in  Paris  in  1746,  and  completed,  in  twenty 
quarto  volumes,  in  1789.10  An  octavo  edition 
was  printed  (1749-1770)  in  seventy-five  vol- 
umes.11 It  was  again  reprinted  at  the  Hague  in 
twenty-five  volumes  quarto  (1747-1780),  with 
considerable  revision,  following  the  original  Eng- 
lish, and  with  Green’s  assistance  ; besides  show- 
ing some  additions.  The  Dutch  editor  was 
P.  de  Hondt,  who  also  issued  an  edition  in  Dutch 
in  twenty-one  volumes  quarto,  — including,  how- 
ever, only  the  first  seventeen  volumes  of  his 
French  edition,  thus  omitting  those  chiefly  con- 
cerning America.12  A small  collection  of  little 
moment,  A New  Universal  Collection  of  Voyages, 
appeared  in  London  in  175 5.13  De  Brosses’  His- 
toire des  navigations  aux  terres  aus trades  depnis 
1501  (Paris,  1756),  two  volumes  quarto,  covers 
Vespucius,  Magellan,  Drake,  and  Cavendish.14 


1 Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  1,400;  Sabin,  viii.  92  ; Muller  (1872),  no.  1,901. 

2 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  745,  who  errs  somewhat  in  his  statements;  Murphy  Catalogue, 
no.  1,074  i Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  88,  with  full  table  of  contents.  The  best  description  is  in  Muller  (1872), 
no.  1,887.  Although  Vander  Aa  says,  in  the  title  of  the  folio  edition,  that  it  is  based  on  the  Gottfriedt-Abelin 
Ncwe  Welt , this  new  collection  is  at  least  four  times  as  extensive. 

8 Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  96. 

4 Carter-Brown,  iii.  no. 

6 Carter-Brown,  iii.  150. 

8 The  publication  began  in  numbers  in  1708,  and  some  copies  are  dated  1710  (Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii. 
no.  158). 

7 Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  208,  in  ten  vols.,  1715-1718.  H.  H.  Bancroft  ( Central  America,  ii.  749), 
cites  an  edition  (1715-1727)  in  nine  vols.  Muller  (1870,  no.  2,021)  cites  an  edition,  ten  vols.,  1731-1738. 

8 Sabin,  vol.  i.  no.  1,250. 

9 Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  792 ; H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  747. 

19  Volumes  xii.  to  xv.  are  given  to  America ; the  later  volumes  were  compiled  by  Ouerlon  and  De 
Leyre. 

11  Different  sets  vary  in  the  number  of  volumes. 

12  Muller  (1872),  nos.  1,895-1,900;  Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  831;  H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America, 
ii.  746.  A German  translation  appeared  at  Leipsic  in  1747  in  twenty-one  volumes. 

18  H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  750. 

14  Muller  (1872),  nos.  1,980,  1,981.  There  was  a German  translation,  with  enlargements,  by  J.  C.  Adelung, 
Halle,  1767;  an  English  translation  is  also  cited.  A similar  range  was  taken  in  Alexander  Dalrymple’s 
Historical  Collection  op  Voyages  in  the  South  Pacific  Ocean  (London,  1770),  of  which  there  was  a French 
translation  in  1774  (Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  1,730).  The  most  important  contribution  in  English  on  this 


XXXVI 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Several  English  collections  appeared  in  the 
next  few  years ; among  which  are  The  World 
Displayed  (London,  1759-1761),  twenty  vols. 
i6mo, — of  which  seven  volumes  are  on  Amer- 
ican voyages,  compiled  from  the  larger  collec- 
tions,1 — and  A Curious  Collection  of  Travels 
(London,  1761)  is  in  eight  volumes,  three  of 
which  are  devoted  to  America.2 

The  Abbe  de  la  Porte’s  Voyageur  Francois, 
in  forty-two  volumes,  1765-1795  (there  are  other 
dates),  may  be  mentioned  to  warn  the  student  of 
its  historical  warp  with  a fictitious  woof.3  John 
Barrows’  Collection  of  Voyages  (London,  1765),  in 
three  small  volumes,  was  translated  into  French 
by  Targe  under  the  title  of  Abrege  chronologique. 
John  Callender’s  Voyages  to  the  Terra  australis 
(London,  1766-1788),  three  volumes,  translated 
for  the  first  time  a number  of  the  narratives  in  De 
Bry,  Hulsius,  and  Thevenot.  It  gives  the  voy- 
ages of  Vespucius,  Magellan,  Drake,  Galle, 
Cavendish,  Hawkins,  and  others.4  Dodsley’s 
Compendium  of  Voyages  was  published  in  the 
same  year  (1766)  in  seven  volumes.5  The  New 
Collection  of  Voyages,  generally  referred  to  as 
Knox’s,  from  the  publisher’s  name,  appeared  in 
seven  volumes  in  1767,  the  first  three  volumes 
covering  American  explorations.6  In  1770  Ed- 
ward Cavendish  Drake’s  New  Universal  Collec- 
tion of  Voyages  was  published  at  London.  The 
narratives  are  concise,  and  of  a very  popular 
character.7  David  Henry,  a magazinist  of  the 
day,  published  in  1773-1774  An  Historical  Ac- 
count of  all  the  Voyages  Round  the  World  by  Eng- 
lish Navigators , beginning  with  Drake  and  Cav- 
endish.8 

La  Harpe  issued  in  Paris,  1780-1801,  in 
thirty-two  volumes,  — Comeyras  editing  the  last 
eleven,  — his  Abrege  de  I'histoire generate  des  voy- 
ages, which  proved  a more  readable  and  pop- 
ular book  than  Prevost’s  collection.  There  have 
been  later  editions  and  continuations.9 

Johann  Reinhold  Forster  made  a positive 
contribution  to  this  field  of  compilation  when 
he  printed  his  Geschichte  der  Entdeckungen  tend 
Schifffahrten  im  Nor  den  at  Frankfort  in  1785. 10 
He  goes  back  to  the  earliest  explorations,  and 
considers  the  credibility  of  the  Zeno  narrative. 


He  starts  with  Gomez  for  the  Spanish  section. 
A French  collection  by  Berenger,  Voyages  faits 
autour  du  monde  (Paris,  1788-1789),  is  very  scant 
on  Magellan,  Drake,  and  Cavendish.  A collec- 
tion was  published  in  London  (1789)  by  Rich- 
ardson on  the  voyages  of  the  Portuguese  and 
Spaniards  during  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth 
centuries.  Mavor’s  Voyages,  Travels,  and  Dis- 
coveries (London,  1796-1802),  twenty-five  vol- 
umes, is  a condensed  treatment,  which  passed  to 
other  editions  in  1810  and  1S13-1S15. 

A standard  compilation  appeared  in  John 
Pinkerton’s  General  Collection  of  Voyages  (London, 
1808-1814),  in  seventeen  volumes,11  with  over  two 
hundred  maps  and  plates,  repeating  the  essential 
English  narratives  of  earlier  collections,  and 
translating  those, from  foreign  languages  afresh, 
preserving  largely  the  language  of  the  explorers. 
Pinkerton,  as  an  editor,  was  learned,  but  some- 
what pedantic  and  over-confident ; and  a certain 
agglutinizing  habit  indicates  a process  of  amass- 
ment rather  than  of  selection  and  assimilation. 
Volumes  xii.,  xiii.,  and  xiv.  are  given  to  Amer- 
ica ; but  the  operations  of  the  Spaniards  on  the 
main,  and  particularly  on  the  Pacific  coast  of 
North  America,  are  rather  scantily  chronicled. 12 

In  1808  was  begun,  under  the  supervision  of 
Malte-Brun  and  others,  the  well-known  Attnales 
des  voyages,  which  was  continued  to  1815,  mak- 
ing twenty-five  volumes.  A new  series,  Nouvelles 
annales  des  voyages,  was  begun  in  1819.  The 
whole  work  is  an  important  gathering  of  original 
sources  and  learned  comment,  and  is  in  consider- 
able part  devoted  to  America.  A French  Collec- 
tion abregie  des  voyages,  by  Bancarel,  appeared 
in  Paris  in  1808-1809,  in  twelve  volumes. 

The  Collection  of  the  best  Voyages  and  Travels, 
compiled  by  Robert  Kerr,  and  published  in 
Edinburgh  in  1811-1824,  >n  eighteen  octavo  vol- 
umes, is  a useful  one,  though  the  scheme  was 
not  wholly  carried  out.  It  includes  an  historical 
essay  on  the  progress  of  navigation  and  discov- 
ery by  W.  Stevenson.  It  also  includes  among 
others  the  Northmen  and  Zeni  voyages,  the  trav- 
els of  Marco  Polo  and  Galvano,  the  African  dis- 
coveries of  the  Portuguese.  The  voyages  of 
Columbus  and  his  successors  begin  in  vol.  iii.; 


subject,  however,  is  in  Dr.  James  Burney’s  Chronological  History  of  Discovery  in  the  South  Sea  (1803-1817), 
five  volumes  quarto. 

1 Dr.  Johnson  wrote  the  Introduction  ; there  was  a third  edition  in  1767  (Bohn’s  Lowndes , p.  2994). 

2 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America , ii.  750. 

3 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  754. 

4 Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  1,494. 

5 Sabin,  v.  473  ; H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  750. 

6 Sabin,  ix.  529  ; Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  1,602;  H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  750. 

7 Carter-Brown,  vol.  iii.  no.  1,733  > H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  751. 

8 H.  II.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  751  ; Allibone. 

9 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  749. 

10  H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  752. 

14  There  was  a quarto  reprint  in  Philadelphia  of  a part  of  it  in  1810-1812. 

12  There  is  a catalogue  of  voyages  and  an  index  in  vol.  xvii.  Cf  Allibone’s  Dictionary. 


THE  EARLY  DESCRIPTIONS  OF  AMERICA. 


XXXVll 


and  the  narratives  of  these  voyages  are  contin- 
ued through  vol.  vi.,  though  those  of  Drake, 
Cavendish,  Hawkins,  Davis,  Magellan,  and 
others  come  later  in  the  series. 

The  Histoire  generate  des  voyages,  undertaken 
by  C.  A.  Walkenaer  in  1826,  was  stopped  in  1831, 
after  twenty-one  octavos  had  been  printed,  with- 
out exhausting  the  African  portion. 

The  early  Dutch  voyages  are  commemorated 
in  Bennet  and  Wijk’s  Nederlandsche  Ontdekkin - 
gen  in  America,  etc.,  which  was  issued  at  Utrecht 
in  1827, 1 and  in  their  Nederlandsche  Zeereizen, 
printed  at  Dordrecht  in  1828-1830,  in  five  volumes 
octavo.  It  contains  Linschoten,  Hudson,  etc. 

Albert  Montemont’s  Bibliotheque  universelle 
des  voyages  was  published  in  Paris,  1833-1836,  in 
forty-six  volumes. 

G.  A.  Wimmer’s  Die  Enthiillung  des  Erd- 
kreises  (Vienna,  1834),  five  volumes  octavo,  is  a 
general  summary,  which  gives  in  the  last  two 
volumes  the  voyages  to  America  and  to  the 
South  Seas.2  • 

In  1837  Henri  Ternaux-Compans  began  the 
publication  of  his  Voyages,  relations,  et  memoires 
originaux  pour  servir  d 1' histoire  de  la  decouverte 
de  1' A merique,  of  which  an  account  is  given  on 
another  page  (see  p.  vi). 

The  collection  of  F.  C.  Marmocchi,  Raccolta 
di  viaggi  dalla  scoperta  del  Nuevo  Contiliente,  was 
published  at  Prato  in  1840-1843,  in  five  volumes ; 
it  includes  the  Navarrete  collection  on  Colum- 


bus, Xeres  on  Pizarro,  and  other  of  the  Spanish 
narratives.3  The  last  volume  of  a collection  in 
twelve  volumes  published  in  Paris,  Nouvelle  bib- 
liothlque  des  voyages,  is  also  given  to  America. 

The  Hakluyt  Society  in  London  began  its 
valuable  series  of  publications  in  1847,  and  has 
admirably  kept  up  its  work  to  the  present  time, 
having  issued  its  volumes  generally  under  satis- 
factory editing.  Its  publications  are  not  sold 
outside  of  its  membership,  except  at  second 
hand.4 

Under  the  editing  of  Jose  Ferrer  de  Couto 
and  Jose  March  y Labores,  and  with  the  royal 
patronage,  a Historia  de  la  marina  real  Espahola 
was  published  in  Madrid,  in  two  volumes,  1849 
and  1854.  It  relates  the  early  voyages.5  Ed- 
ouard Charton’s  Voyageurs  anciens  et  modernes 
was  published  in  four  volumes  in  Paris,  1855— 
1857 ; and  it  passed  subsequently  to  a new 
edition.6 

A summarized  account  of  the  Portuguese  and 
Spanish  discoveries,  from  Prince  Henry  to 
Pizarro,  was  published  in  German  by  Theodor 
Vogel,  and  also  in  English  in  1877. 

A Nouvelle  histoire  des  voyages,  by  Richard 
Cortambert,  is  the  latest  and  most  popular  pre- 
sentation of  the  subject,  opening  with  the  explo- 
rations of  Columbus  and  his  successors ; and 
Edouard  Cat’s  Les  grandes  decouvertes  maritimes 
du  treizilme  au  seizihne  silcle  (Paris,  1882)  is 
another  popular  book. 


1 Stevens,  Bibliotheca  geographica,  no.  317. 

2 Muller  (1872),  no.  1,842. 

3 Muller  (1875),  no.  3>3°3- 

4 Complete  sets  are  sometimes  offered  by  dealers  at  £30  to  £3 5. 

5 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  757. 

6 A Spanish  translation  of  the  modem  voyages  by  Urrabieta  was  published  in  Paris  in  1S60-1861.  The 
Spanish  Enciclopcdia  de  viajes  modernos  (Madrid,  1859),  five  volumes,  edited  by  Fernandez  Cuesta,  refers 
to  the  later  periods  (H.  H.  Bancroft,  Central  America,  ii.  75S). 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL 


HISTORY  OF  AMERICA 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE  GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS 
CONSIDERED  IN  RELATION  TO  THE  DISCOVERY  OF 
AMERICA. 

BY  WILLIAM  H.  TILLINGHAST, 

Assistant  Librarian  of  Harvard  University. 


AS  Columbus,  in  August,  1498,  ran  into  the  mouth  of  the  Orinoco,  he 
little  thought  that  before  him  lay,  silent  but  irrefutable,  the  proof  of 
the  futility  of  his  long-cherished  hopes.  His  gratification  at  the  complete- 
ness of  his  success,  in  that  God  had  permitted  the  accomplishment  of  all 
his  predictions,  to  the  confusion  of  those  who  had  opposed  and  derided 
him,  never  left  him  ; even  in  the  fever  which  overtook  him  on  the  last  voy- 
age his  strong  faith  cried  to  him,  “ Why  dost  thou  falter  in  thy  trust  in 
God?  He  gave  thee  India!  ” In  this  belief  he  died.  The  conviction  that 
Hayti  was  Cipangu,  that  Cuba  was  Cathay,  did  not  long  outlive  its  author ; 
the  discovery  of  the  Pacific  soon  made  it  clear  that  a new  world  and  another 
sea  lay  between  the  landfall  of  Columbus  and  the  goal  of  his  endeavors. 

The  truth,  when  revealed  and  accepted,  was  a surprise  more  profound  to 
the  learned  than  even  the  error  it  displaced.  The  possibility  of  a short  pas- 
sage westward  to  Cathay  was  important  to  merchants  and  adventurers, 
startling  to  courtiers  and  ecclesiastics,  but  to  men  of  classical  learning  it 
was  only  a corroboration  of  the  teaching  of  the  ancients.  That  a barrier  to 
such  passage  should  be  detected  in  the  very  spot  where  the  outskirts  of 
Asia  had  been  imagined,  was  unexpected  and  unwelcome.  The  treasures 
of  Mexico  and  Peru  could  not  satisfy  the  demand  for  the  products  of  the 
East ; Cortes  gave  himself,  in  his  later  years,  to  the  search  for  a strait  which 
might  yet  make  good  the  anticipations  of  the  earlier  discoverers.  The  new 
interpretation,  if  economically  disappointing,  had  yet  an  interest  of  its  own. 
Whence  came  the  human  population  of  the  unveiled  continent  ? How  had 
its  existence  escaped  the  wisdom  of  Greece  and  Rome  ? Had  it  done  so  ? 
Clearly,  since  the  whole  human  race  had  been  renewed  through  Noah,  the 
vol.  1.  — I 


2 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


red  men  of  America  must  have  descended  from  the  patriarch ; in  some  way, 
at  some  time,  the  New  World  had  been  discovered  and  populated  from  the 
Old.  Had  knowledge  of  this  event  lapsed  from  the  minds  of  men  before 
their  memories  were  committed  to  writing,  or  did  reminiscences  exist  in 
ancient  literatures,  overlooked,  or  misunderstood  by  modern  ignorance  ? 
Scholars  were  not  wanting,  nor  has  their  line  since  wholly  failed,  who  freely 
devoted  their  ingenuity  to  the  solution  of  these  questions,  but  with  a suc- 
cess so  diverse  in  its  results,  that  the  inquiry  is  still  pertinent,  especially 
since  the  pursuit,  even  though  on  the  main  point  it  end  in  reservation  of 
judgment,  enables  us  to  understand  from  what  source  and  by  what  channels 
the  inspiration  came  which  held  Columbus  so  steadily  to  his  westward 
course. 

Although  the  elder  civilizations  of  Assyria  and  Egypt  boasted  a cultiva- 
tion of  astronomy  long  anterior  to  the  heroic  age  of  Greece,  their  cosmo- 
graphical  ideas  appear  to  have  been  rude  and  undeveloped,  so  that  whatever 
the  Greeks  borrowed  thence  was  of  small  importance  compared  with  what 
they  themselves  ascertained.  While  it  may  be  doubted  if  decisive  testi- 
mony can  be  extorted  from  the  earliest  Grecian  literature,  represented 
chiefly  by  the  Homeric  and  Hesiodic  poems,  it  is  probable  that  the  people 
among  whom  that  literature  grew  up  had  not  gone,-  in  their  conception  of 
the  universe,  beyond  simple  acceptance  of  the  direct  evidence  of  their 
senses.  The  earth  they  looked  upon  as  a plane,  stretching  away  from  the 
yEgean  Sea,  the  focus  of  their  knowledge,  and  ever  less  distinctly  known, 
until  it  ended  in  an  horizon  of  pure  ignorance,  girdled  by  the  deep-flowing 
current  of  the  river  Oceanus.  Beyond  Oceanus  even  fancy  began  to  fail : 
there  was  the  realm  of  dust  and  darkness,  the  home  of  the  powerless  spirits 
of  the  dead  ; there,  too,  the  hemisphere  of  heaven  joined  its  brother  hemi- 
sphere of  Tartarus.1  This  conception  of  the  earth  was  not  confined  to  Ho- 
meric times,  but  remained  the  common  belief  throughout  the  course  of 
Grecian  history,  underlying  and  outlasting  many  of  the  speculations  of  the 
philosophers. 

That  growing  intellectual  activity  which  was  signalized  by  a notable  de- 
velopment of  trade  and  colonization  in  the  eighth  century,  in  the  seventh 
awoke  to  consciousness  in  a series  of  attempts  to  formulate  the  conditions 
of  existence.  The  philosophy  of  nature  thus  originated,  wherein  the  testi- 
mony of  nature  in  her  own  behalf  was  little  sought  or  understood,  began 
with  the  assumption  of  a flat  earth,  variously  shaped,  and  as  variously  sup- 
ported. To  whom  belongs  the  honor  of  first  propounding  the  theory  of  the 
spherical  form  of  the  earth  cannot  be  known.  It  was  taught  by  the  Italian 
Pythagoreans  of  the  sixth  century,  and  was  probably  one  of  the  doctrines 


1 The  plane  earth  cut  the  cosmic  sphere  like 
a diaphragm,  shutting  the  light  from  Tartarus. 


avrap  vncpOev 

y 7j5  pi£at  n€(f)va.<ri  #cai  arpuyeroio  OaXdaarj^. 

(Hesiod,  Theog.  727.) 


. “ and  above 

Impend  the  roots  of  earth  and  barren  sea.” 

( The  remains  of  Hesiod  the  Ascreean^  etc.,  translated  by 
C.  A.  Elton,  2d  ed.  London,  1815.) 

Critics  differ  as  to  the  age  of  the  vivid  descrip- 
tion of  Tartarus  in  the  Theogony. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


3 


of  Pythagoras  himself,  as  it  was,  a little  later,  of  Parmenides,  the  founder 
of  the  Eleatics.1 

In  neither  case  can  there  be  a claim  for  scientific  discovery.  The  earth 
was  a sphere  because  the  sphere  was  the  most  perfect  form ; it  was  at  the 
centre  of  the  universe  because  that  was  the  place  of  honor;  it  was  motion- 
less because  motion  was  less  dignified  than  rest. 

Plato,  who  was  familiar  with  the  doctrines  of  the  Pythagoreans,  adopted 
their  view  of  the  form  of  the  earth,  and  did  much  to  popularize  it  among 
his  countrymen.2  To  the  generation  that  succeeded  him,  the  sphericity  of 
the  earth  was  a fact  as  capable  of  logical  demonstration  as  a geometrical 
theorem.  Aristotle,  in  his  treatise  “ On  the  Heaven,”  after  detailing  the 
views  of  those  philosophers  who  regarded  the  earth  as  flat,  drum-shaped,  or 
cylindrical,  gives  a formal  summary  of  the  grounds  which  necessitate  the 
assumption  of  its  sphericity,  specifying  the  tendency  of  all  things  to  seek 
.the  centre,  the  unvarying  circularity  of  the  earth’s  shadow  at  eclipses  of  the 
moon,  and  the  proportionate  change  in  the  altitude  of  stars  resulting  from 
changes  in  the  observer’s  latitude.  Aristotle  made  the  doctrine  orthodox  ; 
his  successors,  Eratosthenes,  Hipparchus,  and  Ptolemy,  constituted  it  an 
inalienable  possession  of  the  race.  Greece  transmitted  it  to  Rome,  Rome 
impressed  it  upon  barbaric  Europe ; taught  by  Pliny,  Hyginus,  Manilius, 
expressed  in  the  works  of  Cicero,  Virgil,  Ovid,  it  passed  into  the  school- 
books of  the  Middle  Ages,  whence,  reinforced  by  Arabian  lore,  it  has  come 
down  to  us.3 

That  the  belief  ever  became  in  antiquity  or  in  the  Middle  Ages  widely 
spread  among  the  people  is  improbable  ; it  did  not  indeed  escape  oppo- 
sition among  the  educated ; writers  even  of  the  Augustan  age  sometimes 
appear  in  doubt.4 


1 Pythagoras  has  left  no  writings ; Aristotle 
speaks  only  of  his  school ; Diogenes  Laertius  in 
one  passage  ( Vitae , viii.  i (Pythag.),  25)  quotes 
an  authority  to  the  effect  that  Pythagoras  as- 
serted the  earth  to  be  spherical  and  inhabited 
all  over,  so  that  there  were  antipodes,  to  whom 
that  is  over  which  to  us  is  under.  As  all  his  dis- 
ciples agreed  on  the  spherical  form  of  the  earth 
while  differing  as  to  its  position  and  motion,  it 
is  probable  that  they  took  the  idea  of  its  form 
from  him.  Diogenes  Laertius  states  that  Par- 
menides called  the  earth  round  ( <rrpoyyvAr /,  viii. 
48),  and  also  that  he  spoke  of  it  as  spherical 
(o-tpacpoetSrj,  ix.  3)  ; the  passages  are  not,  as  has 
been  sometimes  assumed,  contradictory.  The 
enunciation  of  the  doctrine  is  often  attributed  to 
Thales  and  to  Anaximander,  on  the  authority 
of  Plutarch,  De placitis philosophorum,  iii.  10,  and 
Diogenes  Laertius,  ii.  1,  respectively;  but  the 
evidence  is  conflicting  (Simplicius,  Ad  Aristot., 
p.  506  b-  ed.  Brandis;  Aristot.,  De  caelo,  ii.  13; 
Plutarch,  De plac.  phil.  iii.,  xv.  9). 

2 Plato,  Phaedo , 109.  Schaefer  is  in  error 

when  he  asserts  {Entwicklung  der  Ansichten  der 


Alten  neber  Gestalt  und  Grosse  der  Erde,  16)  that 
Plato  in  the  Timaeus  (55,  56)  assigns  a cubical 
form  to  the  earth.  The  question  there  is  not 
of  the  shape  of  the  earth,  the  planet,  but  of  the 
form  of  the  constituent  atoms  of  the  element 
earth. 

3  Terra  pilae  similis,  nullo  fulcimine  nixa, 

Aere  subjecto  tam  grave  pendet  onus. 

[Ipsa  volubilitas  libratum  sustinet  orbem  : 
Quique  premit  partes,  angulus  omnis  abest. 
Cumque  sit  in  media  rerum  regione  locata, 

Et  tangat  nullum  plusve  minusve  latus ; 

Ni  convexa  foret,  parti  vicinior  esset, 

Nec  medium  terram  mundus  haberet  onus.] 
Arte  Syracosia  suspensus  in  aere  clauso 
Stat  globus,  immensi  parva  figura  poli ; 

Et  quantum  a sumrnis,  tantum  secessit  ab  imis 
Terra.  Quod  ut  fiat,  forma  rotunda  facit. 

(Ovid,  Fasti,  vi.  269-2S0.) 
The  bracketed  lines  are  found  in  but  a few 
MSS.  The  last  lines  refer  to  a globe  said  to 
have  been  constructed  by  Archimedes. 

4  Plato  makes  Socrates  say  that  he  took  up 
the  works  of  Anaxagoras,  hoping  to  learn 


4 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  sphericity  of  the  earth  once  comprehended,  there  follow  certain 
corollaries  which  the  Greeks  were  not  slow  to  perceive.  Plato,  indeed, 
who  likened  the  earth  to  a ball  covered  with  party-colored  strips  of  leather, 
gives  no  estimate  of  its  size,  although  the  description  of  the  world  in  the 
Phacdo  seems  to  imply  immense  magnitude ; 1 but  Aristotle  states  that 
mathematicians  of  his  day  estimated  the  circumference  at  400,000  stadia,2 
and  Archimedes  puts  the  common  reckoning  at  somewhat  less  than  300,000 
stadia.3  How  these  figures  were  obtained  we  are  not  informed.  The  first 
measurement  of  the  earth  which  rests  on  a known  method  was  that  made 
about  the  middle  of  the  third  century  b.  c.,  by  Eratosthenes,  the  librarian 
at  Alexandria,  who,  by  comparing  the  estimated  linear  distance  between 
Syene,  under  the  tropic,  and  Alexandria  with  their  angular  distance,  as 
deduced  from  observations  on  the  shadow  of  the  gnomon  at  Alexandria, 
concluded  that  the  circumference  of  the  earth  was  250,000  or  252,000 
stadia.4  This  result,  owing  to  an  uncertainty  as  to  the  exact  length  of  the 
stade  used  in  the  computation,  cannot  be  interpreted  with  confidence, 
but  if  we  assume  that  it  was  in  truth  about  twelve  pe’r  cent,  too  large,  we 
shall  probably  not  be  far  out  of  the  way.5  Hipparchus,  in  many  matters 


whether  the  earth  was  round  or  flat  ( Phacdo , 46, 
Stallb.  i.  176).  In  Plutarch’s  dialogue  “ On  the 
face  appearing  in  the  orb  of  the  moon”  one  of  the 
characters  is  lavish  in  his  ridicule  of  the  sphe- 
ricity of  the  earth  and  of  the  theory  of  antipo- 
des. See  also  Lucretius,  De  reruin  nat.,\.  1052, 
etc.,  v.  650 ; Virgil,  Georgies,  i.  247  ; Tacitus, 
Germania,  45. 

1 That  extraordinary  picture  could,  however, 
hardly  have  been  intended  for  an  exposition  of 
the  actual  physical  geography  of  the  globe. 

2 Aristotle,  De  caelo,  ii.  1 5. 

3 Archimedes,  Arenarius,  i.  1,  ed.  Helbig. 
Leipsic,  1881,  vol.  ii.  p.  243. 

4 The  logical  basis  of  Eratosthenes’s  work 
was  sound,  but  the  result  was  vitiated  by  errors 
of  fact  in  his  assumptions,  which,  however,  to 
some  extent  counterbalanced  one  another.  The 
majority  of  ancient  writers  who  treat  of  the 
matter  give  252,000  stadia  as  the  result,  but  Cle- 
omedes  ( Circ . doctr.  de  sttbl.,  i.  10)  gives  250,000. 
It  is  surmised  that  the  former  number  originated 
in  a desire  to  assign  in  round  numbers  700 
stadia  to  a degree.  Forbiger,  Handbuch  der  alten 
Geographie,  i.  180,  n.  27. 

s The  stadium  comprised  six  hundred  feet,  but 
the  length  of  the  Greek  foot  is  uncertain  ; indeed, 
there  were  at  least  two  varieties,  the  Olympic  and 
the  Attic,  as  in  Egypt  there  was  a royal  amt  a com- 
mon ell,  and  a much  larger  number  of  suppositi- 
tious feet  (and,  consequently,  stadia)  have  been 
discovered  or  invented  by  metrologists.  Early 
French  scholars,  like  Rame  eje  l’Isle,  D’Anville, 
Gosselin,  supposed  the  true  length  of  the  earth’s 
circumference  to  be  known  to  the  Greeks,  and 
held  that  all  the  estimates  which  have  come 
down  to  us  were  expressions  of  the  same  value 


in  different  stadia.  It  is  now  generally  agreed 
that  these  estimates  really  denote  different  con- 
ceptions of  the  size  of  the  earth,  but  opinions 
still  differ  widely  as  to  the  length  of  the  stadium 
used  by  the  geographers.  The  value  selected 
by  Peschel  ( Geschichte  der  Erdkunde,  2d  ed.,  p. 
46)  is  that  likewise  adopted  by  Hultsch  ( Griech - 
ischc  und  Romische  Metrologie,  2d  ed.,  1882)  and 
Muellenhof  (. Deutsche  Alter thumskunde,  2d  ed., 
vol.  i.).  According  to  these  writers,  Eratosthe- 
nes is  supposed  to  have  devised  as  a standard 
geographical  measure  a stadium  composed  of 
feet  equal  to  one  half  the  royal  Egyptian  ell. 
According  to  Pliny  (Hist.  Hat.,  xii.  14,  § 5),  Era- 
tosthenes allowed  forty  stadia  to  the  Egyptian 
schonus ; if  we  reckon  the  schonus  at  12,000 
, 12,000 

royal  ells,  we  have  stadium  = X .525™ 

= 157.5™.  This  would  give  a degree  equal  to 
110,250™,  the  true  value  being,  according  to  Pe- 
schel, 1 10,808™.  To  this  conclusion  Lepsius  ( Das 
Stadium  und  die  Gradmessung  des  Eratosthenes 
auf  Grundlage  der  Aegyptischen  Masse,  in  Zeit- 
schrift  fiir  Acgypt.  Sprache  u.  Alterthumskunde, 
xv.  [1S77].  See  also  Die  Langenmasse  der  Alten. 
Berlin,  1884)  objects  that  the  royal  ell  was  never 
used  in  composition,  and  that  the  schonus  was 
valued  in  different  parts  of  Egypt  at  12,000, 
16,000,  24,000,  small  ells.  He  believes  that  the 
schonus  referred  to  by  Pliny  contained  16,000 
small  ells,  so  that  Eratosthenes’s  stadium  = 
16,000 

X .450™  = 180™ 

40 

It  is  possible,  however,  that  Eratosthenes  did 
not  devise  a new  stadium,  but  adopted  that  in 
current  use  among  the  Greeks,  the  Athenian  sta- 
dium. (I  have  seen  no  evidence  that  the  long 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


5 


the  opponent  of  Eratosthenes,  adopted  his  conclusion  on  this  point,  and 
was  followed  by  Strabo,1  by  Pliny,  who  regarded  the  attempt  as  somewhat 
over-bold,  but  so  cleverly  argued  that  it  could  not  be  disregarded,2  and  by 
many  others. 

Fortunately,  as  it  resulted,  this  over-estimate  was  not  allowed  to  stand 
uncontested.  Posidonius  of  Rhodes  (b.  c.  135-51),  by  an  independent 
calculation  based  upon  the  difference  in  altitude  of  Canopus  at  Rhodes 
and  at  Alexandria,  reached  a result  which  is  reported  by  Cleomedes  as 
240,000,  and  by  Strabo  as  180,000  stadia.3  The  final  judgment  of  Posi- 
donius apparently  approved  the  smaller  number  ; it  hit,  at  all  events,  the 
fancy  of  the  time,  and  was  adopted  by  Marinus  of  Tyre  and  by  Ptolemy,4 
whose  authority  imposed  it  upon  the  Middle  Ages.  Accepting  it  as  an 
independent  estimate,  it  follows  that  Posidonius  allowed  but  500  stadia  to 
a degree,  instead  of  700,  thus  representing  the  earth  as  about  28  per  cent, 
smaller  than  did  Eratosthenes.5 

To  the  earliest  writers  the  known  lands  constituted  the  earth;  they  were 
girdled,  indeed,  by  the  river  Oceanus,  but  that  was  a narrow  stream  whose 


Olympic  stadium  was  in  common  use.,)  This 
stadium  is  based  on  the  Athenian  foot,  which, 
according  to  the  investigations  of  Stuart,  has 
been  reckoned  at  .3o8im,  being  to  the  Roman 
foot  as  25  to  24.  This  would  give  a stadium  of 
184.8 m,  and  a degree  of  129,500“.  Now  Stra- 
bo, in  the  passage  where  he  says  that  people 
commonly  estimated  eight  stadia  to  the  mile, 
adds  that  Polybius  allowed  8£  stadia  to  the 
mile  (Geogr.,  vii.  7,  § 4),  and  in  the  fragment 
known  as  the  Table  of  Julian  of  Ascalon 
(Hultsch,  Mctrolog.  script,  reliq.,  Lips.,  1864,  i. 
201 ) it  is  distinctly  stated  that  Eratosthenes  and 
Strabo  reckoned  8^  stadia  to  the  mile.  In  the 
opinion  of  Hultsch,  this  table  probably  belonged 
to  an  official  compilation  mads  under  the  em- 
peror Julian.  Very  recently  W.  Dorpfeld  has 
revised  the  work  of  Stuart,  and  by  a series  of 
measurements  of  the  smaller  architectural  fea- 
tures in  Athenian  remains  has  made  it  appear 
that  the  Athenian  foot  equalled  .2957“  (instead 
of  .3081“),  which  is  almost  precisely  the  Roman 
foot,  and  gives  a stadium  of  177.4“,  which  runs 
8£  to  the  Roman  mile.  If  this  revision  is 
trustworthy,  — and  it  has  been  accepted  by  Lep- 
sius  and  by  Nissel  (who  contributes  the  article 
on  metrology  to  Mueller’s  Handbuch  der  klas- 
sischen  Al/erthumsivisscnschaft,  Nordlingen,  1886, 
etc.),  — it  seems  to  me  probable  that  we  have 
here  the  stadium  used  by  Eratosthenes,  and  that 
his  degree  has  a value  of  124,180“  (Dorpfeld, 
Bcitrage  zur  antiken  Metrologie,  in  Miltheilungen 
des  deutschcn  Archaeolog.  Instituts  zu  Athen , vii. 
(1882),  277). 

1 Strabo,  Geogr.,  ii.  5,  § 7 ; the  estimate  of  Posi- 
donius is  only  quoted  hypothetically  by  Strabo 
(ii.  2,  § 2). 


2 Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.  ii.  1 12, 1 13.  There  is  appar- 
ently some  misunderstanding,  either  on  the  part 
of  Pliny  or  his  copyists,  in  the  subsequent  pro- 
position to  increase  this  estimate  by  12,000 
stadia.  Schaefer’s  ( Philologies , xxviii.  187)  read- 
justment of  the  text  is  rather  audacious.  Pliny’s 
statement  that  Hipparchus  estimated  the  cir- 
cumference at  275,000  stadia  does  not  agree  with 
Strabo  (i.  4,  § 1). 

6 The  discrepancy  is  variously  explained.  Ric- 
cioli,  in  his  Geographia  et  hydrographia  reformata, 
1661,  first  suggested  the  more  commonly  re- 
ceived solution.  Posidonius,  he  thought,  having 
calculated  the  arc  between  Rhodes  and  Alexan- 
dria at  1-48  of  the  circumference,  at  first  assumed 
5,000  stadia  as  the  distance  between  these  places  : 
5,000  X 4S  = 240,000.  Later  he  adopted  a re- 
vised estimate  of  the  distance  (Strabo,  ii.  ch.  v. 
§ 24),  3,750  stadia:  3,750  X 48  = 180,000.  Le- 
tronne  (Mem.  de  P Acad,  des  Inscr.  ct  Belles-Let- 
tres, vi.,  1822)  prefers  to  regard  both  numbers 
as  merely  hypothetical  illustrations  of  the  pro- 
cesses. Hultsch  ( Griechische  it.  Romiscke  Metro- 
logie, 1882,  p.  63)  follows  Freret  and  Gosselin  in 
regarding  both  numbers  as  expressing  the  same 
value  in  stadia  of  different  length  (Forbiger, 
Handbuch  der  alten  Geographic,  i.  360,  n.  29). 
The  last  explanation  is  barred  by  the  positive 
statement  of  Strabo,  who  can  hardly  be  thought 
not  to  have  known  what  he  was  talking  about : 
K&v  twv  i/eovr epcov  Se  avapcTp-pocuv  elodypTaL  7) 
4\axL<STyv  noiovoa  tt)i/  yrjr,  o'lav  S YloOdSdrios 
lyKplvei  ir (pi  oKTUKaiSeKa  p.vpidSas  odour,  (Geogr., 
ii.  2,  § 2.) 

4 Geographia,  vii.  5. 

6 i°=  500  stadia  = 88,700“,  which  is  about 
one  fifth  smaller  than  the  truth. 


6 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


further  bank  lay  in  fable-land.1  The  promulgation  of  the  theory  of  the 
sphericity  of  the  earth  and  the  approximate  determination  of  its  size  drew 
attention  afresh  to  the  problem  of  the  distribution  of  land  and  water  upon 
its  surface,  and  materially  modified  the  earlier  conception.  The  increase 
of  geographical  knowledge  along  lines  of  trade,  conquest,  and  colonization 
had  greatly  extended  the  bounds  of  the  known  world  since  Homer’s  day, 
but  it  was  still  evident  that  by  far  the  larger  portion  of  the  earth,  taking 
the  smallest  estimate  of  its  size,  was  still  undiscovered,  — a fair  field  for 
speculation  and  fantasy.2 

We  can  trace  two  schools  of  thought  in  respect  to  the  configuration 
of  this  unknown  region,  both  represented  in  the  primitive  conception  of 
the  earth,  and  both  conditioned  by  a more  fundamental  postulate.  It  was 
a near  thought,  if  the  earth  was  a sphere,  to  transfer  to  it  the-  systems  of 
circles  which  had  already  been  applied  to  the  heavens.  The  suggestion 
is  attributed  to  Thales,  to  Pythagoras,  and  to  Parmenides ; and  it  is  certain 
that  the  earth  was  very  early  conceived  as  divided  by  the  polar  and 
solstitial  circles  into  five  zones,  whereof  two  only,  the  temperate  in  either 
sphere,  so  the  Greeks  believed,  were  capable  of  supporting  life  ; of  the 
others,  the  polar  were  uninhabitable  from  intense  cold,  as  was  the  torrid 
from  its  parching  heat.  This  theory,  which  excluded  from  knowledge 
the  whole  southern  hemisphere  and  a large  portion  of  the  northern,  was 
approved  by  Aristotle  and  the  Homeric  school  of  geographers,  and  by 
the  minor  physicists.  As  knowledge  grew,  its  truth  was  doubted.  Polybius 
wrote  a monograph,  maintaining  that  the  middle  portion  of  the  torrid  zone 
had  a temperate  climate,  and  his  view  was  adopted  by  Posidonius  and 
Geminus,  if  not  by  Eratosthenes.  Marinus  and  Ptolemy,  who  knew  that 
commerce  was  carried  on  along  the  east  coast  of  Africa  far  below  the 
equator,  cannot  have  fallen  into  the  ancient  error,  but  the  error  long 
persisted  ; it  was  always  in  favor  with  the  compilers,  and  thus  perhaps 
obtained  that  currency  in  Rome  which  enabled  it  to  exert  a restrictive  and 
pernicious  check  upon  maritime  endeavor  deep  into  the  Middle  Ages.3 


1 Xenophanes  is  to  be  excepted,  if,  as  M.  Mar- 
tin supposes,  his  doctrine  of  the  infinite  extent  of 
the  earth  applied  to  its  extent  horizontally  as 
well  as  downward. 

2 The  domain  of  early  Greek  geography  has 
not  escaped  the  incursions  of  unbalanced  inves- 
tigators. The  Greeks  themselves  allowed  the 
Argonauts  an  ocean  voyage:  Crates  and  Strabo 
did  valiant  battle  for  the  universal  wisdom  of 
Homer  ; nor  are  scholars  lacking  to-day  who  will 
demonstrate  that  Odysseus  had  circumnavigat- 
ed Africa,  floated  in  the  shadow  of  Teneriffe  — 

Horace  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding,  — or 
sought  and  found  the  n mth  pole.  The  evidence 
is  against  such  vain  imaginings.  The  world  of 
Homer  is  a narrow  world;  to  him  the  earth  and 
the  Afgean  Sea  are  alike  boundless,  and  in  his 
thought  fairy-land  could  begin  west  of  the  Lotos- 


eaters,  and  one  could  there  forget  the  things  of 
this  life.  There  is  little  doubt  that  the  author  of 
the  Odyssey  considered  Greece  an  island,  and 
Asia  and  Africa  another,  and  thought  the  great 
ocean  eddied  around  the  north  of  Hellas  to  a 
union  with  the  Euxine. 

3  Quinque  tenent  caelum  zonae:  quarum  una 
corusco 

Semper  sole  rubens,  et  torrida  semper  ab  igni; 
Quam  circum  extremae  dextra  laevaque  tra- 
huntur 

Caeruleae  glacie  concretae  atque  imbribus  atris  ; 

Has  inter  mediam  duae  mortalibus  aegris 
Munere  concessae  divom. 

(Virgil,  Georg,  i.  233.) 

The  passage  appears  to  be  paraphrased  from 
similar  lines  which  are  preserved  in  Achilles  Ta- 
tius  (/ sag . in  Phcenom.  Arai. ; Petavius,  Uranolog. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


7 


Upon  the  question  of  the  distribution  of  land  and  water,  unanimity  no 
longer  prevailed.  By  some  it  was  maintained  that  there  was  one  ocean, 
confluent  over  the  whole  globe,  so  that  the  body  of  known  lands,  that 
so-called  continent,  was  in  truth  an  island,  and  whatever  other  inhabitable 
regions  might  exist  were  in  like  manner  surrounded  and  so  separated  by 
vast  expanses  of  untraversed  waves.  Such  was  the  view,  scarcely  more 
than  a survival  of  the  ocean-river  of  the  poets  deprived  of  its  further 
bank  by  the  assumption  of  the  sphericity  of  the  earth,  held  by  Aristotle,1 
Crates  of  Mallus,  Strabo,  Pliny,  and  many  others.  If  this  be  called  the 
oceanic  theory,  we  may  speak  of  its  opposite  as  the  continental : according 
to  this  view,  the  existing  land  so  far  exceeded  the  water  in  extent  that  it 
formed  in  truth  the  continent,  holding  the  seas  quite  separate  within  its 
hollows.  The  origin  of  the  theory  is  obscure,  even  though  we  recall 
that  Homer’s  ocean  was  itself  contained.  It  was  strikingly  presented  by 
Plato  in  the  Phaedo,  and  is  implied  in  the  Atlantis  myth  ; it  may  be  re- 
called, too,  that  Herodotus,  often  depicted  as  a monster  of  credulity,  had 
broken  the  bondage  of  the  ocean-river,  because  he  could  not  satisfy  himself 
of  the  existence  of  the  ocean  in  the  east  or  north ; and  while  reluctantly 
admitting  that  Africa  was  surrounded  by  water,  considered  Gaul  to  ex- 
tend indefinitely  westward.2  Hipparchus  revived  the  doctrine,  teaching 
that  Africa  divided  the  Indian  Ocean  from  the  Atlantic  in  the  south,  so 
that  these  seas  lay  in  separate  basins.  The  existence  of  an  equatorial 
branch  of  the  ocean,  a favorite  dogma  of  the  other  school,  was  also  denied 
by  Polybius,  Posidonius,  and  Geminus.3 

The  reports  of  traders  and  explorers  led  Marinus  to  a like  conclusion  ; 
both  he  and  Ptolemy,  misinterpreting  their  information,  believed  that  the 
eastern  coast  of  Asia  ran  south  instead  of  north,  and  they  united  it  with 
the  eastern  trend  of  Africa,  supposing  at  the  same  time  that  the  two 
continents  met  also  in  the  west.4  The  continental  theory,  despite  its 
famous  disciples,  made  no  headway  at  Rome,  and  was  consequently  hardly 
known  to  the  Middle  Ages  before  its  falsity  was  proved  by  the  circum- 
navigation of  Africa.5 


p.  153),  and  by  him  attributed  to  the  Hermes  of 
Eratosthenes.  See  also  Tibullus,  Eleg.  iv.,  Ovid, 
and  among  the  men  of  science,  Aristotle,  Mete- 
orol. , ii.  5,  §§  11,  13,  15;  Strabo,  Gcogr.,  i.  2, 
§ 24 ; ii.  5,  § 3 ; Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.,  ii.  ch.  68 ; Mela, 
De  chorographia,  i.  1 ; Cicero,  Republ .,  vi.  16; 
Tusc.  Disp.,  i.  28. 

1 Aristotle,  Metcorol.,  ii.  1,  § 10  ; ii.  5,  § 15;  De 
caelo,  ii.  14  ad  Jin.  Letronne,  finding  the  latter 
passage  inconvenient,  reversed  the  meaning  by 
the  arbitrary  insertion  of  a negative  ( Discussion 
de  V opinion  d' Hipparque  sur  le  prolongement  de 
I'Afriqnc  au  sud  de  l' Equator  in  Journal  des 
Savans,  1831,  pp.  476,  545).  The  theory  which 
he  built  upon  this  reconstructed  foundation  so 
impressed  Humboldt  that  he  changed  his  opin- 
ion as  to  the  views  of  Aristotle  on  this  point 


( Examen  critique,  ii.  373).  Such  an  emendation 
is  only  justifiable  by  the  sternest  necessity,  and 
it  has  been  shown  by  Ruge  (Dcr  Chaldaer  Seleu- 
kos,  Dresden,  1865),  and  Prantl  ( Werke  des  A ris- 
toteles  uebersetzt  und  erlautert,  Bd.  ii. ; Die  Him- 
melsgebdude,  note  61),  that  neither  sense  nor 
consistency  requires  the  change. 

2 Herodotus,  ii.  23;  iii.  115;  iv.  36,  40,  45. 

8 Geminus,  Isagoge.  Polybius’s  work  on  this 
question  is  lost,  and  his  own  expressions  as  we 
have  them  in  his  history  are  more  conservative. 
It  is,  he  says,  unknown,  whether  Africa  is  a con- 
tinent extending  toward  the  south,  or  is  sur- 
rounded by  the  sea.  Po.,  - Hist.  iii.  38  ; Hamp- 
ton’s translation  (London,  17,  ,,  i.  334. 

4 Ptolemy,  Geogr.,  vii.  3,  5. 

5 The  circumnavigation  of  Africa  by  Phoeni- 


8 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


That  portion  of  Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa  known  to  the  ancients, 
whether  regarded  as  an  island,  or  as  separated  from  the  rest  of  the  world 
by  climatic  conditions  merely,  or  by  ignorance,  formed  a distinct  concept 
and  was  known  by  a particular  name,  y olKovixevrj.  Originally  supposed  to 
be  circular,  it  was  later  thought  to  be  oblong  and  as  having  a length 
more  than  double  its  width.  Those  who  believed  in  its  insularity  likened 
its  shape  to  a sling,  or  to  an  outspread  chlamys  or  military  cloak,  and 
assumed  that  it  lay  wholly  within  the  northern  hemisphere.  In  absolute 
figures,  the  length  of  the  known  world  was  placed  by  Eratosthenes  at 
77,800  stadia,  and  by  Strabo  at  70,000.  The  latter  figure  remained  the 
common  estimate  until  Marinus  of  Tyre,  in  the  second  century  a.  d., 
receiving  direct  information  from  the  silk-traders  of  a caravan  route  to 
China,  substituted  the  portentous  exaggeration  of  90,000  stadia  on  the 
parallel  of  Rhodes,  or  2250.  Ptolemy,  who  followed  Marinus  in  many 
things,  shrank  from  the  naivete  whereby  the  Tyrian  had  interpreted  a seven 
months’  caravan  journey  to  represent  seven  months’  travelling  in  a direct 
line  at  the  rate  of  twenty  miles  a day,  and  cut  down  his  figures  to  180°,  or 
72,000  stadia.1  It  appears,  therefore,  that  Strabo  considered  the  known 
world  as  occupying  not  much  over  one  third  of  the  circuit  of  the  temperate 
zone,  while  Marinus,  who  adopted  180,000  stadia  as  the  measure  of  the 
earth,  claimed  a knowledge  of  two  thirds  of  that  zone,  and  supposed  that 
land  extended  indefinitely  eastward  beyond  the  limit  of  knowledge. 

What  did  the  ancients  picture  to  themselves  of  this  unknown  portion 
of  the  globe  ? The  more  imaginative  found  there  a home  for  ancient  myth 
and  modern  fable  ; the  geographers,  severely  practical,  excluded  it  from 
the  scope  of  their  survey  ; philosophers  and  physicists  could  easily  supply 
from  theory  what  they  did  not  know  as  fact.  Pythagoras,  it  is  said,  had 
taught  that  the  whole  surface  of  the  earth  was  inhabited.  Aristotle  de- 
monstrated that  the  southern  hemisphere  must  have  its  temperate  zone, 
where  winds  similar  to  our  own  prevailed  ; his  successors  elaborated  the 
hint  into  a systematized  nomenclature,  whereby  the  inhabitants  of  the 
earth  were  divided  into  four  classes,  according  to  their  location  upon  the 
surface  of  the  earth  with  relation  to  one  another.2 

dans  at  the  command  of  Necho,  though  described 
and  accepted  by  Herodotus,  can  hardly  be  called 
an  established  fact,  in  spite  of  all  that  has  been 
written  in  its  favor.  The  story,  whether  true  or 
false,  had,  like  others  of  its  kind,  little  influence 
upon  the  belief  in  the  impassable  tropic  zone,  be- 
cause most  of  those  who  accepted  it  supposed  that 
the  continent  terminated  north  of  the  equator. 

1 Ptolemy,  Geogr.,  i.  11-14.  Eratosthenes  and 
Strabo  located  their  first  meridian  at  Cape  St. 

Vincent ; Marinus  and  Ptolemy  placed  it  in  the 
Canary  group.  See  V01.  II.  p.  95. 

2 Geminus,  Isagoge,  ch.  13;  Achilles  Tatius, 

Isagoge  in  Phantom  . A rati;  Cleomedes,  De  circuits 
sublimis,  i.  2.  The  first  two  are  given  in  the 


Uranologion  of  Petavius,  Lond.,  Paris,  1630,  pp. 
56’  I55- 

The  classes  were  always  divided  on  the  same 
principle,  and  each  contained  two  groups  so  re- 
lated that  they  could  apply  to  one  another  recip- 
rocally the  name  by  which  the  whole  class  was 
designed.  These  names,  however,  are  not  always 
applied  to  the  same  classes  by  different  writers. 
1.  The  first  class  embraced  the  people  who  lived 
in  the  same  half  of  the  same  temperate  zone; 
to  them  all  it  was  day  or  night,  summer  or  win- 
ter, at  the  same  time.  They  were  called  oivoi- 
Koi  by  Cleomedes,  but  weplotKoi  by  Achilles  Ta- 
tius. 2.  The  second  class  included  such  peoples 
as  lived  in  the  same  temperate  zone,  but  were 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


9 


This  system  was  furthest  developed  by  the  oceanic  school.  The  rival  of 
Eratosthenes,  Crates  of  Mallus  (who  achieved  fame  by  the  construction  of  a 
large  globe),  assumed  the  existence  of  a southern  continent,  separated  from 
the  known  world  by  the  equatorial  ocean  ; it  is  possible  that  he  introduced 
the  idea  of  providing  a distinct  residence  for  each  class  of  earth-dwellers,  by 
postulating  four  island  continents,  one  in  each  quarter  of  the  globe.  Eratos- 
thenes probably  thought  that  there  were  inhabitable  regions  in  the  southern 
hemisphere,  and  Strabo  added  that  there  might  be  two,  or  even  more,  hab- 
itable earths  in  the  northern  temperate  zone,  especially  near  the  parallel  of 
Rhodes.1  Crates  introduced  his  views  at  Rome,  and  the  oceanic  theory 
remained  a favorite  with  the  Roman  physicists.  It  was  avowed  by  Pliny, 
who  championed  the  existence  of  antipodes  against  the  vulgar  disbelief.  In 
the  fine  episode  in  the  last  book  of  Cicero’s  Republic , the  younger  Scipio 
relates  a dream,  wherein  the  elder  hero  of  his  name,  Scipio  Africanus,  con- 
veying him  to  the  lofty  heights  of  the  Milky  Way,  emphasized  the  futility 
of  fame  by  showing  him  upon  the  earth  the  regions  to  which  his  name  could 
never  penetrate  : “ Thou  seest  in  what  few  places  the  earth  is  inhabited,  and 
those  how  scant ; great  deserts  lie  between  them,  and  they  who  dwell  upon 
the  earth  are  not  only  so  scattered  that  naught  can  spread  from  one  com- 
munity to  another,  but  so  that  some  live  off  in  an  oblique  direction  from 
you,  some  off  toward  the  side,  and  some  even  dwell  directly  opposite  to 
you.”2  Mela  confines  himself  to  a mention  of  the  Antichthones,  who  live 
in  the  temperate  zone  in  the  south,  and  are  cut  off  from  us  by  the  inter- 
vening torrid  zone.3 


divided  by  half  the  circumference  of  that  zone  ; 
so  that  while  they  all  had  summer  or  winter  at 
the  same  time,  the  one  group  had  day  when  the 
other  had  night,  and  vice  versa.  These  groups 
could  call  one  another  ircpioiKoi  according  to  Cle- 
omedes,  but  avTlxOoves  according  to  Tatius.  3. 
The  third  class  included  those  who  were  divided 
by  the  torrid  zone,  so  that  part  lived  in  the  north- 
ern temperate  zone  and  part  in  the  southern, 
but  yet  so  that  all  were  in  the  same  half  of  their 
respective  zones  ; i.  e.,  all  were  in  either  the  east- 
ern or  western,  upper  or  lower,  hemisphere.  Day 
and  night  were  shared  by  the  whole  class  at 
once,  but  not  the  seasons,  the  liorthern  group 
having  summer  when  the  southern  had  winter, 
and  vice  versa.  These  groups  could  call  one 
another  S.vtoikoi.  4'  "1  he  fourth  class  comprised 
the  groups  which  we  know  as  antipodes,  dwell- 
ing with  regard  to  one  another  in  different  halves 
of  the  two  temperate  zones,  so  that  they  had  nei- 
ther seasons  nor  day  or  night  in  common,  but 
stood  upon  the  globe  diametrically  opposed  to 
one  another.  All  writers  agree  in  calling  these 
groups  avrliroSes.  The  introduction  of  the  word 
antichthones  in  place  of  pcriocci  was  due,  appar- 
ently, to  a misunderstanding  of  the  Pythagorean 
antickthon.  This  name  was  properly  applied  to 
the  imaginary  planet  invented  by  the  early  Py- 
thagoreans to  bring  the  number  of  the  spheres 


up  to  ten  ; it  was  located  between  the  earth  and 
the  central  fire,  and  had  the  same  period  of  revo- 
lution as  the  earth,  from  the  outer,  Grecian,  side 
of  which  it  was  never  visible.  This  “opposite 
earth,”  Gegcnerdc,  was  later  confused  with  the 
other,  western,  or  lower  hemisphere  of  the  earth 
itself.  It  was  also  sometimes  applied  to  the 
inhabitants  of  the  southern  hemisphere,  as  by 
Cicero  in  the  Tusculan  Disputations  (i.  2S),  “ dua- 
bus  oris  distantibus  habitabilem  et  cultum;  qua- 
rum  altera  quam  nos  incolimus, 

Sub  axe  posita  ad  Stellas  septem  unde  horrifer 
Aquiloni  stridor  gelidas  molitur  nives, 
altera  australis,  ignota  nobis,  quam  vocant  Graci 
ai >t!x9ovo.  ” Mela  has  the  same  usage  (i.  4,  5),  as 
quoted  below.  Macrobius,  Comm,  in  Somn.  Scip. 
lib.  ii.  5,  uses  the  nomenclature  of  Cleomedes. 
Reinhardt,  quoted  in  Engelmann’s  Bibliotheca 
classica  Grceca,  under  Geminus,  I have  not  been 
able  to  see. 

1 Strabo,  i.  4,  § 6,  7 ; i.  2,  § 24.  Geminus,  Isa- 
goge,  13.  Muellenhof,  Deutsche  Alterthumshunde, 
i.  247-254.  Berger,  Geogr.  Fragments  d.  Eratos- 
thenes, 8,  84. 

2 Cicero,  RespubL,  vi.  15  . . . sed  partim  obli- 
quos,  partim  transversos,  partim  etiam  adversos 
stare  vobis.  Some  MSS.  read  aversos.  See  also 
Tusc.  Disp.,  i.  28  ; Acad.,  ii.  39. 

3 Antichthones  alteram  [zonam],  nos  alteram 


IO  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 

Indeed,  the  southern  continent,  the  other  world,  as  it  was  called,1  made  a 
more  distinct  impression  than  the  possible  other  continents  in  the  northern 
hemisphere.  Hipparchus  thought  that  Trapobene  might  be  a part  of  this 
southern  world,  and  the  idea  that  the  Nile  had  its  source  there  was  wide- 
spread : some  supposing  that  it  flowed  beneath  the  equatorial  ocean ; others 
believing,  with  Ptolemy,  that  Africa  was  connected  with  the  southern  con- 


MACROBIUS.* 


R1PKIMO 


evtrq. 


mom.  peev/ la. 


maberviw 


ALVEKT  OCEANl 


PERKT 


1TEMPERATA  ahtipodvm 


NOBLT  INCOGNITA 


FRIGI  DA 


tinent.  The  latter  doctrine  was  shattered  by  the  discovery  of  the  Cape  of 
Good  Hope  ; but  the  continent  was  revived  when  Tierra  del  Fuego,  Aus- 
tralia, and  New  Zealand  were  discovered,  and  attained  gigantic  size  on  the 


incolimus.  Illius  situs  ob  ardorem  interceden- 
tis  plagae  incognitus,  huius  dicendus  est.  Haec 
ergo  ab  ortu  porrecta  ad  occasum,  et  quia  sic 
iacet  aliquanto  quam  ubi  latissima  est  longior, 
ambitur  omnis  oceano.  Mela,  Chor.,  i.  4,  5.  Be- 
cause Mela  says  that  the  known  world  is  but  lit- 
tle longer  than  its  width,  it  has  been  supposed 
that  he  was  better  informed  than  his  contempo- 
raries, and  attributed  something  like  its  real 
extent  to  Africa.  Thomassy  (Les  papes  gSo- 
graphiques,  Paris,  1852,  p.  17)  finds  in  his  work 
a rival  system  to  that  of  Ptolemy.  The  discov- 
ery of  America,  he  thinks,  was  due  to  Ptolemy; 
that  of  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  to  Mela.  It 
was  the  good  fortune  of  Mela  that  his  work  was 
widely  read  in  the  Middl ; Ages,  and  had  great 
influence ; but  we  owe  him  no  new  system  of 
geography,  since  he  simply  adopted  the  oceanic 


theory  as  represented  by  Strabo  and  Crates. 
That  he  slightly  changed  the  traditional  propor- 
tion between  the  length  and  breadth  of  the 
known  world  is  of  small  importance.  The 
known  world,  he  states,  was  surrounded  by  the 
ocean,  and  there  is  nothing  to  show  that  he  sup- 
posed Africa  to  extend  below  the  equator.  In 
his  description  of  Africa  he  applies  the  terms 
length  and  breadth  not  as  we  should,  but  with 
contrary  usage : “ Africa  ab  orientis  parte  Nilo 
terminata,  pelago  a ceteris,  brevior  est  quidem 
quam  Europa,  quia  nec  usquam  Asiae  et  non 
totis  huius  litoribus  obtenditur,  longior  tamen 
ipsa  quam  latior,  et  qua  ad  fluvium  adtingit  latis- 
sima,” etc.,  i.  20.  (Ed.  Parthey,  1867.) 

1 Mela,  i.  54,  “Alter  orbis.”  Cicero,  Tusc. 
Disp.,  i.  28,  “ Ora  Australis.” 


* From  Macrobii  Ambrosii  Aurelii  Theodosii  in  Somnium  Scipionis , Lib.  II.  (Lugduni,  1560). 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


II 


maps  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  ; only  within  the  last  two 
centuries  has  it  shrunk  to  the  present  limits  of  the  antarctic  ice. 

The  oceanic  theory,  and  the 
doctrine  of  the  Four  Worlds, 
as  it  has  been  termed,1  terra 
quadrifiga,  was  set  forth  in  the 
greatest  detail  in  a commen- 
tary on  the  Dream  of  Scipio, 
written  by  Macrobius,  prob- 
ably in  the  fifth  century  A.  d. 

In  the  concussion  and  repul- 
sion of  the  ocean  streams  he 
found  a sufficient  cause  for 
the  phenomena  of  the  tides.2 

Such  were  the  theories  of 
the  men  of  science,  purely 
speculative,  originating  in 
logic,  not  discovery,  and  they 
give  no  hint  of  actual  knowl- 
edge regarding  those  distant  macrobius* 


1 Hyde  Clarke,  Atlantis , in  the  Transactions 
of  the  Royal  Historical  Society,  London,  New 
Series,  vol.  iii. ; Reinaud,  Relations  politiques, 
etc.,  de  Vempire  Romaine  avec  l' Asie  orientate, 
etc.,  in  the  Journal  Asiatique,  1863,  p.  140. 

2 The  exposition  of  Macrobius  is  so  interest- 
ing as  illustrating  the  mathematical  and  physical 
geography  of  the  ancients,  and  as  showing  how 
thoroughly  the  practical  consequences  of  the 
sphericity  of  the  earth  were  appreciated ; it  is  so 
important  in  the  present  connection  as  demon- 
strating that  the  whole  idea  of  inhabited  lands 
in  other  parts  of  the  earth  was  based  on  logic 
only,  not  on  knowledge,  that  I have  ventured  to 
quote  from  it  somewhat  freely. 

Macrobius,  Comm,  in  Somn.  Scipionis,  ii.  5.  — 
“Cernis  autem  eamdem  terrain  quasi  quibusdam 
redimitam  et  circumdatam  cingulis,  e quibus 
duos  maxime  inter  se  diversos,  et  caeli  verticibus 
„psis  ex  utraque  parte  subnixos,  obriguisse  pruina 
vides ; medium  autem  ilium,  et  maximum,  solis 
ardore  torreri.  Duo  sunt  habitabiles : quorum 
australis  ille,  in  quo  qui  insistunt,  adversa  vobis 
urgent  vestigia,  nihil  ad  vestrum  genus;  hie 
autem  alter  subjectus  aquiloni,  quern  incolitis, 
cerne  quam  tenui  vos  parte  contingat.  Omnis 
enim  terra,  quae  colitur  a vobis,  angusta  ver- 
ticibus, lateribus  latior,  parva  quaedam  insula 
est.  . . .”  (Cicero.)  . . . Nam  et  septentriona- 
lis  et  australis  extremitas  perpetua  obriguerunt 
pruina.  . . . Horum  uterque  habitations  impa- 
tiens  est.  . . . Medius  cingulus  et  ideo  maximus, 


aeterno  afflatu  continui  caloris  ustus,  spatium 
quod  et  lato  anrbitu  et  prolixius  occupavit,  nimi- 
etate  fervoris  facit  inhabitabile  victuris.  Inter 
extremes  vero  et  medium  duo  majores  ultimis, 
medio  minores  ex  utriusque  vicinitatis  intempe- 
rie  temperantur.  . . . Licet  igitur  sint  hae  duae 
. . . quas  diximus  temperatas,  non  tamen  ambae 
zonae  hominibus  nostri  generis  indultae  sunt : 

sed  sola  superior incolitur  ab  ornni,  quale 

scire  possumus,  hominum  genere,  Romani  Grae- 
cive  sint,  vel  barbari  cuj usque  nationis.  Ilia  vero 
. . . sola  ratione  intelligitur,  quod  propter  simi- 
lem  temperiem  similiter  incolatur,  sed  a quibus, 
neque  licuit  unquam  nobis  nec  licebit  cognoscere : 
interjecta  enim  torrida  utrique  hominum  generi 
commercium  ad  se  denegat  commeandi . . . Nec 
dubium  est,  nostrum  quoque  septentrionem  [ven- 
tum]  ad  illos  qui  australi  adjacent,  propter  eam- 
dem rationem  calidum  pervenire,  et  austrum  cor- 
poribus  eorum  gemino  aurae  suae  rigore  blandiri. 
Eadem  ratio  nos  non  permittit  ambigere  quin 
per  illam  quoque  superficiem  terrae  quae  ad  nos 
habetur  inferior,  integer  zonarum  ambitus  quae 
hie  temperatae  sunt,  eodem  ductu  temperatus 
habeatur  ; atque  ideo  illic  quoque  eaedem  duae 
zonae  a se  distantes  similiter  incolantur.  . . . 
Nam  si  nobis  vivendi  facultas  est  in  hac  terrarum 
parte  quam  colimus,  quia,  calcantes  humum, 
caelum  suspicimus  super  verticem,  quia  sol  no- 
bis et  oritur  et  occidit,  quia  circumfuso  fruimur 
aere  cujus  spiramus  haustu,  cur  non  et  illic 
aliquos  vivere  credamus  ubi  eadem  semper  in 


* From  Avr.  Theodosii  Macrobii  Opera  (Lipsi®,  1774). 


12 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


regions  with  which  they  deal.  From  them  we  turn  to  examine  the  literature 

of  the  imagination,  for  geogra- 
phy, by  right  the  handmaid  of 
history,  is  easily  perverted  to 
the  service  of  myth. 

The  expanding  horizon  of  the 
Greeks  was  always  hedged  with 
fable  : in  the  north  was  the 
realm  of  the  happy  Hyperbo- 
reans, beyond  the  blasts  of  Bo- 
reas ; in  the  east,  the  wonder- 
land of  India  ; in  the  south,  Pan- 
chaea  and  the  blameless  Ethio- 
pians ; nor  did  the  west  lack 
lingering  places  for  romance. 
Here  was  the  floating  isle  of 
HSolus,  brazen-walled  ; here  the 
macrobius*  mysterious  Ogygia,  navel  of  the 

sea  ; 1 and  on  the  earth’s  ex- 
tremest  verge  were  the  Elysian  Fields,  the  home  of  heroes  exempt  from 


promptu  sunt  ? Nam,  qui  ibi  dicuntur  morari, 
eamdem  credendisuntspirare  auram,  quia  eadem 
est  in  ejusdem  zonalis  ambitus  continuatione 
temperies.  Idem  sol  illis  et  obire  dicitur  nostro 
ortu,  et  orietur  quum  nobis  occidet:  calcabunt 
aeque  ut  nos  humum,  et  supra  verticem  semper 
caelum  videbunt.  Nec  metus  erit  ne  de  terra  in 
caelum  decidant,  quum  nihil  unquam  possit  ruere 
sursum.  Si  enim  nobis,  quod  asserere  genus  joci 
est,  deorsum  habitur  ubi  est  terra,  et  sursum  ubi 
est  caelum,  illis  quoque  sursum  erit  quod  de  in- 
feriore  suspicient,  nec  aliquando  in  superna  ca- 
suri  sunt. 

Hi  quos  separat  a nobis  perusta,  quos  Graeci 
olvtolkovs  vocant,  similiter  ab  illis  qui  inferiorem 
zonae  suae  incolunt  partem  interjecta  australi 
gelida  separantur.  Rursus  illos  ab  avroiKois  suis, 
id  est  per  nostri  cinguli  inferiora  viventibus,  in- 
terjectio  ardentis  sequestrat : et  illi  a nobis  sep- 
tentrionalis  extremitatis  rigore  removentur.  Et 
quia  non  est  una  omnium  affinis  continuatio, 
sed  interjectae  sunt  solitudines  ex  calore  vel 
frigore  mutuum  negantibus  commeatum,  has 
terrae  partes  quae  a quattuor  hominum  generibus 
incoluntur,  maculas  habitationum  vocavit.  . . . 

9.  Is  enim  quern  solum  oceanum  plures  opi- 
nantur,  de  finibus  ab  illo  originali  refusis,  secun- 
dum ex  necessitate  ambitum  fecit.  Ceterum  prior 
ejus  corona  per  zonam  errae  calidam  meat, 
superiora  terrarum  et  inferiora  cingens,  flexum 
circi  equinoctialis  imitata.  Ab  oriente  vero  duos 


sinus  refundit,  unum  ad  extremitatem  septentri- 
onis,  ad  australis  alterum:  rursusque  ab  occi- 
dente  duo  pariter  enascuntur  sinus,  qui  usque  ad 
ambas,  quas  supra  diximus,  extremitates  refusi 
occurrunt  ab  oriente  demissis ; et,  dum  vi  summa 
et  impetu  immaniore  miscentur,  invicemque  se 
feriunt,  ex  ipsa  aquarum  collisione  nascitur  ilia 
famosa  oceani  accessio  pariter  et  recessio.  . . . 
Ceterum  verior,  ut  ita  dicam,  ejus  alveus  tenet 
zonam  perustam  ; et  tarn  ipse  qui  equinoctialem, 
quam  sinus  ex  eo  nati  qui  horizontem  circulum 
ambitu  suae  flexionis  imitantur,  omnem  terram 
quadrifidam  divid  ant,  et  singulas,  ut  supra  dixi- 
mus, habitationes  insulas  faciunt  . . . binas  in 
superiore  atque  inferiore  terrae  superficie  in- 
sulas. . . . 

1 Mr.  Gladstone  (Homer  and  the  Homeric  age , 
vol.  iii.)  transposes  these  Homeric  localities  to 
the  east,  and  a few  German  writers  agree  with 
him.  President  Warren  ( True  key  to  ancient 
cosmologies,  etc.,  Boston,  1882)  will  have  it  that 
Ogygia  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  the  north 
pole.  Neither  of  these  views  is  likely  to  dis- 
place the  one  now  orthodox.  Mr.  Gladstone  is 
so  much  troubled  by  Odysseus’s  course  on  leav- 
ing Ogygia  that  he  cannot  hide  a suspicion  of 
corruption  in  the  text.  President  Warren  should 
remember  that  Ogygia  apparently  enjoyed  the 
common  succession  of  day  and  night.  In  Ho- 
meric thought  the  western  sea  extended  north- 
ward and  eastward  until  it  joined  the  Euxine. 


* After  Santarem’s  Atlas,  as  a “mappemonde  tiree  d’un  manuscrit  de  Macrobe  du  Xeme  sifecle. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


13 


death,  “where  life  is  easiest  to  man.  No  snow  is  there,  nor  yet  great  storm 
nor  any  rain,  but  always  ocean  sendeth  forth  the  breeze  of  the  shrill  west  to 
blow  cool  on  men.”1  Across  the  ocean  river,  where  was  the  setting  of  the 
sun,  all  was  changed.  There  was  the  home  of  the  Cimmerians,  who  dwelt 
in  darkness ; there  the  grove  of  Persephone  and  the  dreary  house  of  the 
dead.2 

In  the  Hesiodic  poems  the  Elysian  Fields  are  transformed  into  islands, 
the  home  of  the  fourth  race,  the  heroes,  after  death  : — 

“ Them  on  earth’s  utmost  verge  the  god  assign’d 
A life,  a seat,  distinct  from  human  kind  : 

Beside  the  deepening  whirlpools  of  the  main, 

In  those  blest  isles  where  Saturn  holds  his  reign, 

Apart  from  heaven’s  immortals  calm  they  share 
A rest  unsullied  by  the  clouds  of  care : 

And  yearly  thrice  with  sweet  luxuriance  crown’d 
Springs  the  ripe  harvest  from  the  teeming  ground.”  8 

“ Those  who  have  had  the  courage  to  remain  stedfast  thrice  in  each  life, 
and  to  keep  their  souls  altogether  from  wrong,”  sang  Pindar,  “pursue  the 
road  of  Zeus  to  the  castle  of  Cronos,  where  o’er  the  isles  of  the  blest 
ocean  breezes  blow,  and  flowers  gleam  with  gold,  some  from  the  land  on 
glistering  trees,  while  others  the  water  feeds  ; and  with  bracelets  of  these 
they  entwine  their  hands  and  make  crowns  for  their  heads.”  4 

The  Islands  of  the  Blest,  /xaKapwv  vr/croi,  do  not  vanish  henceforward  from 
the  world’s  literature,  but  continue  to  haunt  the  Atlantic  through  the  Ro- 
man period  and  deep  into  the  Middle  Ages.  In  the  west,  too,  were  localized 
other  and  wilder  myths ; here  were  the  scenes  of  the  Perseus  fable,  the 
island  of  the  weird  and  communistic  sisters,  the  Graeae,  and  the  Gorgon- 
ides,  the  homes  of  Medusa  and  her  sister  Gorgons,  the  birthplace  of  the 
dread  Chimaera.5  The  importance  of  the  far  west  in  the  myths  connected 


Ogygia,  located  northwest  of  Greece,  would  be 
the  centre,  omphalos , of  the  sea,  as  Delphi  was 
later  called  the  centre  of  the  land-masses  of  the 
world. 

1 Odyssey , iv.  56r,  etc. 

2 It  is  well  known  that  whereas  Odysseus 
meets  the  spirits  of  the  dead  across  Oceanus, 
upon  the  surface  of  the  earth,  there  is  in  the 
Iliad  mention  of  a subterranean  Hades.  The 
Assyrio-Babylonians  had  also  the  idea  of  an 
earth-encircling  ocean  stream,  — the  word  ’H/cea- 
vbs  the  Greeks  said  was  of  foreign  origin,  — and 
on  the  south  of  it  they  placed  the  sea  of  the 
dead,  which  held  the  island  homes  of  the  de- 
parted. As  in  the  Odyssey,  it  was  a place  given 
over  to  dust  and  darkness,  and  the  doors  of  it 
were  strongly  barred  ; no  living  being  save  a 
god  or  a chosen  hero  might  come  there.  Schra- 
der, Namen  d.  Meerc  in  d.  Assyrischen  Inschrif- 
ten  ( Abhandl . d.  k.  Akad.  d.  Wiss.  zit  Berlin, 
1877,  p.  169).  Jeremias,  Die  Babylonisch- Assyri- 
schen Vorstellungen  vom  Leben  nach  dem  Tode 


(Leipzig,  tSS7).  The  Israelites,  on  the  other 
hand,  imagined  the  home  of  the  dead  as  under- 
ground. Numbers,  xvi.  30,  32,  33. 

Buchholtz,  Die  Homerische  Realien,  i.  55, 
places  Hades  on  the  European  shores  of  Ocean, 
but  the  text  of  the  Odyssey  seems  plainly  in 
favor  of  the  site  across  the  stream,  as  Volcker 
and  others  have  understood. 

3 Hesiod,  Works  and  Days,  166-173  ; Elton’s 
translation,  London,  1815,  p.  22.  Paley  marks 
the  line  TrjAov  an'  adavartev  roiaiv  K pivos  i/a/ia- 
<t iXeuet  as  probably  spurious.  Cronos  appears 
to  have  been  originally  a Phoenician  deity,  ancj, 
his  westward  wandering  played  an  important 
part  in  their  mythology.  We  shall  find  further 
traces  of  this  divinity  in  the  west. 

4 Pindar,  Oly7tip.,  ii.  66-85,  Paley’s  translation, 
London,  1868,  p.  12.  See  also  Euripides,  He- 
lena, 1677. 

6 AEschylus,  in  the  Prometheus  bound,  intro- 
duced the  Gorgon  islands  in  his  epitome  of  the 
wanderings  of  Io,  and  certainly  seems  to  speak 


14 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


with  Hercules  is  well  known.  In  the  traditionary  twelve  labors  the  Greek 
hero  is  confused  with  his  prototype  the  Tyrian  Melkarth,  and  those  labors 
which  deal  with  the  west  were  doubtless  borrowed  from  the  cult  which 
the  Greeks  had  found  established  at  Gades  when  trade  first  led  them 
thither.  In  the  tenth  labor  it  is  the  western  isle  Erytheia,  which  Hercules 
visits  in  the  golden  cup  wherein  Helios  was  wont  to  make  his  nocturnal 
ocean  voyage,  and  from  which  he  returns  with  the  oxen  of  the  giant 
Geryon.  Even  more  famous  was  the  search  for  the  apples  of  the  Hes- 
perides,  which  constituted  the  eleventh  labor.  This  golden  fruit,  the  wed- 
ding gift  produced  by  Gaa  for  Hera,  the  prudent  goddess,  doubtful  of  the 
security  of  Olympus,  gave  in  charge  to  the  Hesperian  maids,  whose  island 
garden  lay  at  earth’s  furthest  bounds,  near  where  the  mysterious  Atlas, 
their  father  or  their  uncle,  wise  in  the  secrets  of  the  sea,  watched  over  the 
pillars  which  propped  the  sky,  or  himself  bore  the  burden  of  the  heavenly 
vault.  The  poets  delighted  to  depict  these  isles  with  their  shrill-singing 
nymphs,  in  the  same  glowing  words  which  they  applied  to  the  Isles  of  the 
Blessed.  “Oh  that  I,  like  a bird,  might  fly  from  care  over  the  Adriatic 
waves  ! ” cries  the  chorus  in  the  Crowned  Hippolytus, 

“ Or  to  the  famed  Hesperian  plains, 

Whose  rich  trees  bloom  with  gold, 

To  join  the  grief-attuned  strains 
My  winged  progress  hold  : 

Beyond  whose  shores  no  passage  gave 
The  ruler  of  the  purple  wave  ; 

“ But  Atlas  stands,  his  stately  height 
The  awfull  boundary  of  the  skies : 

There  fountains  of  Ambrosia  rise, 

Wat’ring  the  seat  of  Jove  : her  stores 
Luxuriant  there  the  rich  soil  pours 

All,  which  the  sense  of  gods  delights.” 1 

When  these  names  first  became  attached  to  some  of  the  Atlantic  islands 
is  uncertain.  Diodorus  Siculus  does  not  apply  either  term  to  the  island 
discovered  by  the  Carthaginians,  and  described  by  him  in  phrases  appli- 
cable to  both.  The  two  islands  described  by  sailors  to  Sertorius  about  So 
b.  c.  were  depicted  in  colors  which  reminded  Plutarch  of  the  Isles  of  the 
Blessed,  and  it  is  certain  that  toward  the  close  of  the  republic  the  name 
Insulae  Fo-rtunatae  was  given  to  certain  of  the  Atlantic  islands,  including  the 
Canaries.  In  the  time  of  Juba,  king  of  Numidia,  we  seem  to  distinguish  . 
at  least  three  groups,  the  Insulae  Fortunatae,  the  Purpurariae,  and  the 
Hesperides,  but  beyond  the  fact  that  the  first  name  still  designated  some  of 
the  Canaries  identification  is  uncertain  ; some  have  thought  that  different 
groups  among  the  Canaries  were  known  by  separate  names,  while  others 

of  them  as  in  the  east ; the  passage  is,  however,  1 Euripides,  Hippolytus , 742-751;  Potter’s 
imperfect,  and  its  interpretation  has  overtasked  translation,  i.  p.  356.  See  also  Hesiod,  Theog 
the  ablest  commentators.  215,  51 7— 519. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


15 


hold  that  one  or  both  of  the  Madeira  and  Cape  de  Verde  groups  were 
known.1  The  Canaries  were  soon  lost  out  of  knowledge  again,  but  the 
Happy  or  Fortunate  Islands  continued  to  be  an  enticing  mirage  through- 
out the  Middle  Ages,  and  play  a part  in  many  legends,  as  in  that  of  St. 
Brandan,  and  in  many  poems.2 

Beside  these  ancient,  widespread,  popular  myths,  embodying  the  uni- 
versal longing  for  a happier  life,  we  find  a group  of  stories  of  more  recent 
date,  of  known  authorship  and  well-marked  literary  origin,  which  treat  of 
western  islands  and  a western  continent.  The  group  comprises,  it  is  hardly 
necessary  to  say,  the  tale  of  Atlantis,  related  by  Plato  ; the  fable  of  the 
land  of  the  Meropes,  by  Theopompus ; and  the  description  of  the  Satur- 
nian continent  attributed  to  Plutarch. 

The  story  of  Atlantis,  by  its  own  interest  and  the  skill  of  its  author,  has 
made  by  far  the  deepest  impression.  Plato,  having  given  in  the  Republic 
a picture  of  the  ideal  political  organization,  the  state,  sketched  in  the  Ti- 
maeus  the  history  of  creation,  and  the  origin  and  development  of  mankind  ; 
in  the  Critias  he  apparently  intended  to  exhibit  the  action  of  two  types 
of  political  bodies  involved  in  a life-and-death  contest.  The  latter  dialogue 
was  unfinished,  but  its  purport  had  been  sketched  in  the  opening  of  the 
Timaeus.  Critias  there  relates  “a  strange  tale,  but  certainly  true,  as  Solon 
declared,”  which  had  come  down  in  His  family  from  his  ancestor  Dropidas, 
a near  relative  of  Solon.  When  Solon  was  in  Egypt  he  fell  into  talk  with 
an  aged  priest  of  Sals,  who  said  to  him  : “ Solon,  Solon,  you  Greeks  are 
all  children,  — there  is  not  an  old  man  in  Greece.  You  have  no  old  tradi- 
tions, and  know  of  but  one  deluge,  whereas  there  have  been  many  destruc- 
tions of  mankind,  both  by  flood  and  fire  \ Egypt  alone  has  escaped  them, 
and  in  Egypt  alone  is  ancient  history  recorded ; you  are  ignorant  of  your 
own  past.”  For  long  before  Deucalion,  nine  thousand  years  ago,  there  was 
an  Athens  founded,  like  Sai’s,  by  Athena ; a city  rich  in  power  and  wisdom, 
famed  for  mighty  deeds,  the  greatest  of  which  was  this.  At  that  time  there 
lay  opposite  the  columns  of  Hercules,  in  the  Atlantic,  which  was  then  navi- 
gable, an  island  larger  than  Libya  and  Asia  together,  from  which  sailors 
could  pass  to  other  islands,  and  so  to  the  continent.  The  sea  in  front  of  the 
straits  is  indeed  but  a small  harbor ; that  which  lay  beyond  the. island,  how- 
ever, is  worthy  of  the  name,  and  the  land  which  surrounds  that  greater  sea 
may  be  truly  called  the  continent.  In  this  island  of  Atlantis  had  grown 
up  a mighty  power,  whose  kings  were  descended  from  Poseidon,  and  had 

1 Mela,  iii.  100,  102,  etc.  The  chief  passage  2 Tzetzes  ( Scholia  in  lycopliron , 1204,  ed. 
is  Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.,  vi.  36,  37,  who  took  his  in-  Mueller,  ii.  954),  a grammarian  of  the  twelfth 
formation  from  King  Juba  and  a writer  named  century,  says  that  the  Isles  of  the  Blessed  were 
Statius  Sebosus.  Pliny,  who,  beside  the  groups  located  in  the  ocean  by  Homer,  Hesiod,  Euri- 
named  in  the  text,  mentions  the  Gorgades,  which  pides,  Plutarch,  Dion,  Procopius,  Philostratus 
he  identifies  with  the  place  where  Hanr.o  met  and  others,  but  that  to  many  it  seems  that 
the  gorillas,  has  probably  misunderstood  and  Britain  must  be  the  true  Isle  of  the  Blessed;  and 
garbled  his  authorities ; his  account  is  contradic-  in  support  of  this  view  he  relates  a most  curious 
tory  and  illusive.  tale  of  the  ferriage  of  the  dead  to  Britain  by 

Breton  fishermen. 


16  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 

extended  their  sway  over  many  islands  and  over  a portion  of  the  great  con- 
tinent ; even  Libya  up  to  the  gates  of  Egypt,  and  Europe  as  far  as  Tyrrhe- 
nia,  submitted  to  their  sway.  Ever  harder  they  pressed  upon  the  other 
nations  of  the  known  world,  seeking  the  subjugation  of  the  whole.  “Then, 
O Solon,  did  the  strength  of  your  republic  become  clear  to  all  men,  by 
reason  of  her  courage  and  force.  Foremost  in  the  arts  of  war,  she  met  the 
invader  at  the  head  of  Greece ; abandoned  by  her  allies,  she  triumphed 
alone  over  the  western  foe,  delivering  from  the  yoke  all  the  nations  within 
the  columns.  But  afterwards  came  a day  and  night  of  great  floods  and 
earthquakes  ; the  earth  engulfed  all  the  Athenians  who  were  capable  of 
bearing  arms,  and  Atlantis  disappeared,  swallowed  by  the  waves  : hence  it  is 
that  this  sea  is  no  longer  navigable,  from  the  vast  mud-shoals  formed  by  the 
vanished  island.”  This  tale  so  impressed  Solon  that  he  meditated  an  epic 
on  the  subject,  but  on  his  return,  stress  of  public  business  prevented  his 
design.  In  the  Critias  the  empire  and  chief  city  of  Atlantis  is  described 
with  wealth  of  detail,  and  the  descent  of  the  royal  family  from  Atlas,  son 
of  Poseidon,  and  a nymph  of  the  island,  is  set  forth.  In  the  midst  of  a 
council  upon  Olympus,  where  Zeus,  in  true  epic  style,  was  revealing  to  the 
gods  his  designs  concerning  the  approaching  war,  the  dialogue  breaks  off. 

Such  is  the  tale  of  Atlantis.  Read  in  Plato,  the  nature  and  meaning  of 
the  narrative  seem  clear,  but  the  commentators,  ancient  and  modern,  have 
made  wild  work.  The  voyage  of  Odysseus  has  grown  marvellously  in 
extent  since  he  abandoned  the  sea ; Io  has  found  the  pens  of  the  learned 
more  potent  goads  than  Hera’s  gadfly  ; but  the  travels  of  Atlantis  have 
been  even  more  extraordinary.  No  region  has  been  so  remote,  no  land  so 
opposed  by  location,  extent,  or  history  to  the  words  of  Plato,  but  that  some 
acute  investigator  has  found  in  it  the  origin  of  the  lost  island.  It  has 
been  identified  with  Africa,  with  Spitzbergen,  with  Palestine.  The  learned 
Latreille  convinced  himself  that  Persia  best  fulfilled  the  conditions  of  the 
problem  ; the  more  than  learned  Rudbeck  ardently  supported  the  claims  of 
Sweden  through  three  folios.  In  such  a search  America  could  not  be 
overlooked.  Gomara,  Guillaume  de  Postel,  Wytfliet,  are  among  those  who 
have  believed  that  this  continent  was  Atlantis;  Sanson  in  1669,  and  Vau- 
gondy  in  1762,  ventured  to  issue  a map,  upon  which  the  division  of  that 
island  among  the  sons  of  Neptune  was  applied  to  America,  and  the  outskirts 
of  the  lost  continent  were  extended  even  to  New  Zealand.  Such  work,  of 
course,  needs  no  serious  consideration.  Plato  is  our  authority,  and  Plato  de 
dares  that  Atlantis  lay  not  far  west  from  Spain,  and  that  it  disappeared  som( 
8,000  years  before  his  day.  An  inquiry  into  the  truth  or  meaning  of  the 
record  as  it  stands  is  quite  justifiable,  and  has  been  several  times  under- 
taken, with  divergent  results.  Some,  notably  Paul  Gaffarel 1 and  Ignatius 
Donnelly,2  are  convinced  that  Plato  merely  adapted  to  his  purposes  a story 

1 L'Atlantide,  by  Paul  Gaffarel,  in  the  Revue  les  rapports  de  P Amerique  et  de  Vancicn  continent 
de  Geographic,  April,  May,  June,  July,  1880  (vi.  avant  Christophe  Colomb  (Paris,  1869). 

241,  331, 421  ; vii.  21).  See  also,  in  his  Etude  sur  2 Atlantis:  the  antediluvian  world.  New  York, 

1882. 


TRACES  OF  ATLANTIS. 


Section  of  a map  given  in  Brtefe  iiber  Amerika  aus  don  Italienischen  des  Hn.  Grafen  Carlo  Carli 
■ubersctzt,  Dritter  Theil  (Gera,  1785),  where  it  is  called  an  “ Auszug  aus  denen  Karten  welche  der  Pariser 
Akademie  der  Wissenschaften  (1737,  1752)  von  dem  Herrn  von  Buache  iibergeben  worden  sind.” 

VOL.  I.  — 2 


The  annexed  cut  is  an  extract  from  Sanson’s  map  of  America,  showing  views  respecting  the  new  world  as 
constituting  the  Island  of  Atlantis.  It  is  called : Atlantis  insula  h Nicolao  Sanson,  antiquitati  restituta; 
nunc  demum  majori  forma  dclineata,  et  in  decern  regna  juxta  decern  Ncftuni  filios  distributa.  Prcctcrea 
insults,  nostnzq.  continentis  regiones  quibus  imperavere  Atlantici  reges ; aut  quas  armis  tentavere,  ex 
conatibus  geographicis  G-ilielmi  Sanson,  Nicolai  filii  (Amstelodami  apud  Petrum  Mortier).  Uricoechea  in 
the  Mapoteca  Colombiana  puts  this  map  under  1600,  and  speaks  of  a second  edition  in  1688,  whicn  must  be 
an  error.  Nicholas  Sanson  was  born  in  1600,  his  son  William  died  in  1703.  Beside  the  undated  Amsterdam 
print  quoted  above,  Harvard  College  Library  possesses  a copy  in  which  the  words  Novus  orbis  potius  Altera 
continent  sive  are  prefixed  to  the  title,  while  the  date  mdclxviiij  is  inserted  after  filii.  This  copy  was 
published  by  Le  S.  Robert  at  Paris  in  1741. 


CARTE  CONJECTURALE  DE  L’ATLANTIDE. 

From  a map  in  Bory  de  St.  Vincent’s  Essais  sur  les  isles  Fortunecs,  Paris  [1803].  A map  in  Anas- 
tasias Kircher’s  Mundus  Subterrcineus  (Amsterdam,  1678),  i.  82,  shows  Atlantis  as  a large  island  midway 
between  the  pillars  of  Hercules  and  America. 


CONTOUR  CHART  OF  THE  BOTTOM  OF  THE  ATLANTIC. 

Sketched  from  the  colored  map  of  the  United  States  Hydrographic  office,  as  given  in  Alexander  Agassiz’s 
Three  Cruises  of  the  Blake  (Cambridge,  1888),  vol.  i.  The  outline  of  the  continents  is  shown  by  an  un- 
broken line.  The  500  fathom  shore  line  is  a broken  one  ( ).  The  2,000  fathom  shore 

line  is  made  by  a dash  and  dot  ( . . . ).  The  large  areas  in  mid-ocean  enclosed  by  this  line, 

have  this  or  lesser  depths.  Of  the  small  areas  marked  by  this  line,  the  depth  of  2,000  fathoms  or  less  is  within 
these  areas  in  all  cases  except  as  respects  the  small  areas  on  the  latitude  of  Newfoundland,  where  the  larger 
areas  of  2,000  fathoms’  depth  border  on  tne  small  areas  of  greater  depth.  Depths  varying  from  1,500  to 
1,000  fathoms  are  shown  by  horizontal  lines  ; from  1,000  to  500  by  perpendicular  lines;  and  the  crossed  lines 
show  the  shallowest  spots  in  mid-ocean  of  500  fathoms  or  less.  The  areas  of  greatest  depth  (over  3,500 
fathoms)  are  marked  with  crosses. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


21 


which  Solon  had  actually  brought  from  Egypt,  and  which  was  in  all  essen- 
tials true.  Corroboration  of  the  existence  of  such  an  island  in  the  Atlantic 
is  found,  according  to  these  writers,  in  the  physical  conformation  of  the 
Atlantic  basin,  and  in  marked  resemblances  between  the  flora,  fauna, 
civilization,  and  language  of  the  old  and  new  worlds,  which  demand  for  their 
explanation  the  prehistoric  existence  of  just  such  a bridge  as  Atlantis  would 
have  supplied.  The  Atlantic  islands  are  the  loftiest  peaks  and  plateaus  of 
the  submerged  island.  In  the  widely  spread  deluge  myths  Mr.  Donnelly 
finds  strong  confirmation  of  the  final  cataclysm ; he  places  in  Atlantis  that 
primitive  culture  which  M.  Bailly  sought  in  the  highlands  of  Asia,  and 
President  Warren  refers  to  the  north  pole.  Space  fails  for  a proper  exam- 
ination of  the  matter,  but  these  ingenious  arguments  remain  somewhat  top- 
heavy  when  all  is  said.  The  argument  from  ethnological  resemblances  is 
of  all  arguments  the  weakest  in  the  hands  of  advocates.  It  is  of  value  only  > 
when  wielded  by  men  of  judicial  temperament,  who  can  weigh  difference 
against  likeness,  and  allow  for  the  narrow  range  of  nature’s  moulds.  The 
existence  of  the  ocean  plateaus  revealed  by  the  soundings  of  the  “ Dolphin 
and  the  “Challenger”  proves  nothing  as  to  their  having  been  once  raised 
above  the  waves  ; the  most  of  the  Atlantic  islands  are  sharply  cut  off  from 
them.  Even  granting  the  prehistoric  migration  of  plants  and  animals  be- 
tween America  and  Europe,  as  we  grant  it  between  America  and  Asia,  it 
does  not  follow  that  it  took  place  across  the  mid-ocean,  and  it  would  still 
be  a long  step  from  the  botanic  “bridge”  and  elevated  “ridge”  to  the 
island  empire  of  Plato.  In  short,  the  conservative  view  advocated  by  Lon- 
ginus, that  the  story  was  designed  by  Plato  as  a literary  ornament  and  a 
philosophic  illustration,  is  no  less  probable  to-day  than  when  it  was  sug- 
gested in  the  schools  of  Alexandria.  Atlantis  is  a literary  myth,  belonging 
with  Utopia , the  New  Atlantis , and  the  Orbis  alter  et  idem  of  Bishop  Hall. 


Of  the  same  type  is  a narrative  which  has  come  down  indirectly,  among 
the  flotsam  and  jetsam  of  classic  literature : it  is  a fragment  from  a lost 
work  by  Theopompus  of  Chios,  a historian  of  the  fourth  century  b.  c.,  found 
in  the  Varia  Historia  of  Aelian,  a compiler  of  the  third  century  a.  d.1  The 
story  is  told  by  the  satyr  Silenus  to  Midas,  king  of  Phrygia,  and  is,  as  few 
commentators  have  refrained  from  remarking,  worthy  the  ears  of  its  audi- 
tor.2 “Selenus  tolde  Midas  of  certaine  Islands,  named  Europa,  Asia,  and 
Libia,  which  the  Ocean  Sea  circumscribeth  and  compasseth  round  about. 
And  that  without  this  worlde  there  is  a continent  or  percell  of  dry  lande, 
which  in  greatnesse  (as  hee  reported)  was  infinite  and  unmeasurable,  that  it 
nourished  and  maintained,  by  the  benifite  of  the  greene  medowes  and  pas- 


1 Theopomp.,  Fragmenta,  ed.  Wieters,  1829, 
no.  76,  p.  72.  Gcographi  Graec.  minores,  ed. 

Mueller,  i.  289.  Aeliani,  Var.  Hist.,  iii.  18.  The 
extracts  in  the  text  are  taken  from  “A  Registre 
of  Hy stories,  etc.,  written  in  Greeke  by  Aelianus,  a 


Roman,  and  delivered  in  English  by  A.fbraham] 
F.[leming].”  London,  1576,  fol.  36. 

2 We  owe  this  quip  to  Tertullian  (he  at  least 
is  the  earliest  writer  to  whom  I can  trace  it) : 
“Ut  Silenus  penes  aures  Midae  blattit,  aptai 
sane  grandioribus  fabulis  (De  pallio,  cap.  2). 


22 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


ture  plots,  sundrye  bigge  and  mighty  beastes  ; that  the  men  which  inhabite 
the  same  climats,  exceede  the  stature  of  us  twise,  and  yet  the  length  of 
there  life  is  not  equale  to  ours.”  Many  other  wonders  he  related  of  the 
two  cities,  Machimus,  the  warlike,  and  Euseues,  the  city  of  peace,  and  how 
the  inhabitants  of  the  former  once  made  an  attack  upon  Europe,  and  came 
first  upon  the  Hyperboreans  ; but  learning  that  they  were  esteemed  the 
most  holy  of  the  dwellers  in  that  island,  they  “ had  them  in  contempte,  de- 
testing and  abhorring  them  as  naughty  people,  of  preposterous  properties, 
and  damnable  behauiour,  and  for  that  cause  interrupted  their  progresse, 
supposing  it  an  enterprise  of  little  worthinesse  or  rather  none  at  al,  to  tra- 
uaile  into  such  a countrey.”  The  concluding  passage  relating  to  the  strange 
country  inhabited  by  the  Meropes,  from  whose  name  later  writers  have 
called  the  continent  Meropian,  bears  only  indirectly  upon  the  subject,  as 
characterizing  the  whole  narrative.1 

Without  admitting  the  harsh  judgment  of  Aelian,  who  brands  Theopom- 
pus  as  a “ coyner  of  lyes  and  a forger  of  fond  fables,”  it  is  clear  that  we  are 
dealing  here  with  literature,  not  with  history,  and  that  the  identification  of 
the  land  of  the  Meropes,  or,  as  Strabo  calls  it,  Meropis,  with  Atlantis  or 
with  America  is  arbitrary  and  valueless.2 


1 “ Furthermore  he  tolde  one  thing  among  all 
others,  meriting  admiration,  that  certain  men 
called  Meropes  dwelt  in  many  cittyes  there  about, 
and  that  in  the  borders  adiacent  to  their  coun- 
trey, was  a perilous  place  named  Anostus,  that  is 
to  say,  wythout  retourne,  being  a gaping  gulfe 
or  bottomles  pit,  for  the  ground  is  as  it  were 
cleft  and  rent  in  sonder,  in  so  much  that  it  open- 
eth  like  to  the  mouth  of  insatiable  hell,  y*  it  is 
neither  perfectly  lightsome,  nor  absolutely  dark- 
some, but  that  the  ayer  hangeth  ouer  it,  being 
tempered  with  a certaine  kinde  of  dowdy  rednes, 
that  a couple  of  floodes  set  their  recourse  that 
way,  the  one  of  pleasure  the  other  of  sorow,  and 
that  about  each  of  them  growe  plantes  answear- 
able  in  quantity  and  bignes  to  a great  plaine  tree. 
The  trees  which  spring  by  ye  flood  of  sorow 
yeldeth  fruite  of  one  nature,  qualitie,  and  opera- 
tion. For  if  any  man  taste  thereof,- a streame 
of  teares  floweth  from  his  eyes,  as  out  of  a con- 
duite  pipe,  or  sluse  in  a running  riuer,  yea,  such 
effect  followeth  immediately  after  the  eating  of 
the  same,  that  the  whole  race  of  their  life  is 
turned  into  a tragical  lamentation,  in  so  much 
that  weeping  and  wayling  knitteth  their  carkeses 
depriued  of  vitall  mouing,  in  a winding  sheete, 
and  maketh  them  gobbettes  for  the  greedy  graue 
to  swallow  and  deuoure.  The  other  trees  which 
prosper  vpon  the  bankes  of  the  floode  of  pleas- 
ure, beare  fruite  cleane  contrary  to  the  former, 
for  whosoeuer  tasbeth  thereof,  he  is  presently 
weined  from  the  pappes  of  his  auncient  appetites 
and  inueterate  desires,  & if  he  were  linked  in 
loue  to  any  in  time  past,  he  is  fettered  in  the 
forgetfulnes  of  them,  so  that  al  remembrance  is 


quite  abolished,  by  litle  and  litle  he  recouereth 
the  yeres  of  his  youth,  reasuming  vnto  him  by 
degrees,  the  times  & seasons,  long  since,  spent 
and  gone.  For,  the  frowardnes  and  crookednes 
of  old  age  being  first  shaken  of,  the  amiablenes 
and  louelynesse  of  youth  beginneth  to  budde,  in 
so  much  as  they  put  on  ye  estate  of  stripplings, 
then  become  boyes,  then  change  to  children, 
then  reenter  into  infancie,  & at  length  death 
maketh  a finall  end  of  all.” 

Compare  the  story  told  by  Mela  (iii.  10)  about 
the  Fortunate  Isles:  “Una  singulari  duorum 
fontium  ingenio  maxime  insignis:  alterum  qui 
gustavere  risu  solvuntur,  ita  adfectis  remedium 
est  ex  altero  bibere.” 

It  should  be  noted  that  the  country  described 
by  Theopompus  is  called  by  him  simply  “ The 
Great  Continent.” 

2 Strabo,  vii.  3,  § 6.  Perizonius  makes  this  pas- 
sage in  Aelian  the  peg  for  a long  note  on  ancient 
knowledge  of  America,  in  which  he  brings  to- 
gether the  most  important  passages  bearing  on 
the  subject.  He  remarks:  “Nullus  tamen  du- 
bito,  quin  Veteres  aliquid  crediderint  vel  scive- 
rent,  sed  quasi  per  nebulam  et  caliginem,  de 
America,  partim  ex  antiqua  traditione  ab  Aegyp- 
tiis  vel  Carthaginiensibus  accepta,  partim  ex 
ratiocinatione  de  forma  et  situ  orbis  terrarum, 
unde  colligebant,  superesse  in  hoc  orbe  etiam 
alias  terras  praeter  Asiam,  Africam,  & Euro- 
pam.”  In  my  opinion  their  assumed  knowl- 
edge was  based  entirely  on  ratiocination,  and 
was  not  real  knowledge  at  all ; but  Perizonius 
well  expresses  the  other  view. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


23 


The  same  remark  applies  to  the  account  of  the  great  Saturnian  continent 
that  closes  the  curious  and  interesting  dialogue  “ On  the  Face  appearing  in 
the  Orb  of  the  Moon,”  attributed  to  Plutarch,  and  printed  with  his  Morals  : 

“ ‘ An  isle,  Ogygia,  lies  in  Ocean’s  arms,’  ” says  the  narrator,  “ about 
five  days’  sail  west  from  Britain ; and  before  it  are  three  others,  of  equal 
distance  from  one  another,  and  also  from  that,  bearing  northwest,  where 
the  sun  sets  in  summer.  In  one  of  these  the  barbarians  feign  that  Saturn 
is  detained  in  prison  by  Zeus.”  The  adjacent  sea  is  termed  the  Saturnian, 
and  the  continent  by  which  the  great  sea  is  circularly  environed  is  distant 
from  Ogygia  about  five  thousand  stadia,  but  from  the  other  islands  not  so 
far.  A bay  of  this  continent,  in  the  latitude  of  the  Caspian  Sea,  is  inhab- 
ited by  Greeks.  These,  who  had  been  visited  by  Heracles,  and  revived 
by  his  followers,  esteemed  themselves  inhabitants  of  the  firm  land,  calling 
all  others  islanders,  as  dwelling  in  land  encompassed  by  the  sea.  Every 
thirty  years  these  people  send  forth  certain  of  their  number,  who  minister  to 
the  imprisoned  Saturn  for  thirty  years.  One  of  the  men  thus  sent  forth,  at 
the  end  of  his  service,  paid  a visit  to  the  great  island,  as  they  called  Europe. 
From  him  the  narrator  learned  many  things  about  the  state  of  men  after 
death,  which  he  unfolds  at  length,  the  conclusion  being  that  the  souls  of 
men  ultimately  arrive  at  the  moon,  wherein  lie  the  Elysian  Fields  of  Ho- 
mer. “And  you,  O Lamprias,”  he  adds,  “may  take  my  relation  in  such 
part  as  you  please.”  After  which  hint  there  is,  I think,  but  little  doubt  as 
to  the  way  in  which  it  should  be  taken  by  us.1 

That  Plato,  Theopompus,  and  Plutarch,  covering  a range  of  nearly  five 
centuries,  should  each  have  made  use  of  the  conception  of  a continent  be- 
yond the  Atlantic,  is  noteworthy ; but  it  is  more  naturally  accounted  for  by 
supposing  that  all  three  had  in  mind  the  continental  hypothesis  of  land  dis- 
tribution, than  by  assuming  for  them  an  acquaintance  with  the  great  west- 
ern island,  America.  From  this  point  of  view,  the  result  of  our  search  into 
the  geographical  knowledge  and  mythical  tales  of  the  ancients  is  purely 
negative.  We  find,  indeed,  well-developed  theories  of  physical  geography, 
one  of  which  accords  remarkably  well  with  the  truth  ; but  we  also  find  that 
these  theories  rest  solely  on  logical  deductions  from  the  mathematical  doc- 
trine of  the  sphere,  and  on  an  aesthetic  satisfaction  with  symmetry  and 
analogy.  This  conclusion  could  be  invalidated  were  it  shown  that  explora-  * 
tion  had  already  revealed  the  secrets  of  the  west,  and  we  must  now  consider 
this  branch  of  the  subject. 

The  history  of  maritime  discovery  begins  among  the  Phoenicians.  The 
civilization  of  Egypt,  as  self-centred  as  that  of  China,  accepted  only 
the  commerce  that  was  brought  to  its  gates ; but  the  men  of  Sidon  and 
Tyre,  with  their  keen  devotion  to  material  interests,  their  almost  modern 
ingenuity,  had  early  appropriated  the  carrying  trade  of  the  east  and  the 
west.  As  they  looked  adventurously  seaward  from  their  narrow  domain, 

1 Mare  Cronium  was  the  name  given  to  a portion  of  the  northern  ocean.  Forbiger,  Handbuch , 
ii.  3,  note  9. 


24 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


the  dim  outline  of  Cyprus  beckoned  them  down  a long  lane  of  island  sta- 
tions to  the  rich  shores  of  Spain.  Even  their  religion  betrayed  their  bent : 
El  and  Cronos,  their  oldest  deities,  were  wanderers,  and  vanished  in  the 
west ; on  their  traces  Melkarth  led  a motley  swarm  of  colonists  to  the  At- 
lantic. These  legends,  filtering  through  Cyprus,  Crete,  or  Rhodes,  or  borne 
by  rash  adventurers  from  distant  Gades,  appeared  anew  in  Grecian  mythol- 
ogy, the  deeds  of  Melkarth  mingling  with  the  labors  of  Hercules.  We  do 
not  know  when  the  Phoenicians  first  reached  the  Atlantic,  nor  what  were 
tne  limits  of  their  ocean  voyages.  Gades,  the  present  Cadiz,  just  outside 
the  Straits  of  Gibraltar,  was  founded  a few  years  before  noo  b.  c.,  but  not, 
it  is  probable,  without  previous  knowledge  of  the  commercial  importance 
of  the  location.  There  were  numerous  other  settlements  along  the  adjacent 
coast,  and  the  gold,  silver,  and  tin  of  these  distant  regions  grew  familiar  in 
the  markets  of  Egypt,  Mesopotamia,  and  India.  The  trade  with  Tartessus, 
the  El  Dorado  of  antiquity,  gave  the  Phoenician  merchant  vessels  a name 
among  the  Jews,  as  well  in  the  tenth  century,  when  Solomon  shared  the 
adventures  of  Hiram,  as  in  the  sixth,  when  Ezekiel  depicted  the  glories  of 
Tyrian  commerce.  The  Phoenician  seamanship  was  wide-famed  ; their  ves- 
sels were  unmatched  in  speed,1  and  their  furniture  and  discipline  excited 
the  outspoken  admiration  of  Xenophon.  Beside  the  large  Tarshish  ships, 
they  possessed  light  merchant  vessels  and  ships  of  war,  provided  with  both 
sails  and  oars,  and  these,  somewhat  akin  to  steamships  in  their  indepen- 
dence of  wind,  were  well  adapted  for  exploration.  Thus  urged  and  thus 
provided,  it  is  improbable  that  the  Phoenicians  shunned  the  great  ocean. 
The  evidence  is  still  strong  in  favor  of  their  direct  trade  with  Britain  for 
tin,  despite  what  has  been  urged  as  to  tin  mines  in  Spain  and  the  prehis- 
toric existence  of  the  trade  by  land  across  Gaul.2 


Whether  the  Tyrians  discovered  any  of  the  Atlantic  islands  is  unknown  ; 
the  adventures  and  discoveries  attributed  to  Hercules,  who  in  this  aspect 
is  but  Melkarth  in  Grecian  raiment,  points  toward  an  early  knowledge  of 
western  islands,  but  these  myths  alone  are  not  conclusive  proof.  Diodorus 
Siculus  attributes  to  the  Phoenicians  the  discovery,  by  accident,  of  a large 
island,  with  navigable  rivers  and  a delightful  climate,  many  days’  sail  west- 
ward from  Africa.  In  the,  compilation  De  Mirabilibus  Auscultationibus, 
printed  with  the  works  of  Aristotle,  the  discovery  is  attributed  to  Cartha- 


1 The  average  of  all  known  rates  of  speed 
with  ancient  ships  is  about  five  knots  an  hour ; 
some  of  the  fastest  runs  were  at  the  rate  of  seven 
knots,  or  a little  more.  Breusing,  Nautik  der 

Alten , Bremen,  1886,  pp.  u,  12.  Movers,  Die 
Phcettizier , ii.  3,  190.  Movers  estimates  the  rate 
of  a Phoenician  vessel  with  180  oarsmen  at 
double  that  of  a Greek  merchantman.  He  com- 
pares the  sailing  qualities  of  Phoenician  vessels 
with  those  of  Venice  in  the  Middle  Ages  to  the 
disadvantage  of  the  latter.  As  the  ancients  had 


nothing  answering  to  our  log,  and  their  contriv- 
ances for  time-keeping  were  neither  trustworthy 
nor  adapted  for  use  on  shipboard,  these  esti- 
mates are  necessarily  based  on  a few  reports  of 
the  number  of  days  spent  on  voyages  of  known 
length,  — a rather  uncertain  method. 

2 Tin  exists  in  some  of  the  islands  of  the  In- 
dian Ocean,  and  they  were  worked  at  a 'ater  pe- 
riod, but  there  is  no  direct  evidence,  as  far  as  I 
am  aware,  that  they  were  known  at  the  date 
when  Tyre  was  most  flourishing. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


25 


ginians.  Both  versions  descend  from  one  original,  now  lost,  and  it  is  im- 
possible to  give  a date  to  the  event,  or  to  identify  the  locality.1  Those  who 
find  America  in  the  island  of  Diodorus  make  improbabilities  supply  the 
lack  of  evidence.  Stories  seldom  lose  in  the  telling,  and  while  it  is  not 
impossible  that  a Phoenician  ship  might  have  reached  America,  and  even 
made  her  way  back,  it  is  not  likely  that  the  voyage  would  have  been  tamely 
described  as  of  many  days'  duration. 

When  Carthage  succeeded  Tyre  as  mistress  of  the  Mediterranean  com- 
merce, interest  in  the  West  revived.  In  the  middle  of  the  fifth  century  b.  c., 
two  expeditions  of  importance  were  dispatched  into  these  waters.  A large 
fleet  under  Hanno  sailed  to  colonize,  or  re-colonize,  the  western  coast  of 
Africa,  and  succeeded  in  reaching  the  latitude  of  Sierra  Leone.  Himilko, 
voyaging  in  the  opposite  direction,  spent  several  months  in  exploring  the 
ocean  and  tracing  the  western  shores  of  Europe.  He  appears  to  have 
run  into  the  Sargasso  Sea,  but  beyond  this  little  is  known  of  his  adven- 
tures.2 

Ultimately  the  Carthaginians  discovered  and  colonized  the  Canary 
Islands,  and  perhaps  the  Madeira  and  Cape  Verde  groups  ; the  evidence  of 
ethnology,  the  presence  of  Semitic  inscriptions,  and  the  occurrence  in  the 
descriptions  of  Pliny,  Mela,  and  Ptolemy  of  some  of  the  modern  names  of 
the  separate  islands,  establishes  this  beyond  a doubt  for  the  Canaries.3 
There  is  no  evidence  that  the  Phoenicians  or  Carthaginians  penetrated 
much  beyond  the  coast  islands,  or  that  they  reached  any  part  of  America, 
or  even  the  Azores. 

The  achievements  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans  were  still  more  limited. 
A certain  Colaeus  visited  Gades  towards  the  middle  of  the  seventh  century 
B.  c.,  and  was,  according  to  Herodotus,  the  first  Greek  who  passed  outside 
of  the  columns  of  Hercules.  His  example  could  not  have  been  widely 


1 Diodorus  Siculus,  v.  18,  19;  De  Mirab. 
Auscult.,  84.  Miillenhof,  Deutsche  Alterthums- 
kunde , i.,  Berlin,  1870,  p.  467,  traces  the  report 
through  the  historian  Timaeus  to  Punic  sources. 

2 The  narration  of  Hanno’s  voyage  has  been 

preserved,  apparently  in  the  words  of  the  com- 
mander’s report.  Geographi  Graeci  minores, 
ed.  Mueller  (Paris,  1855),  i.  pp.  1-14.  Cf.  also 
Prolegom.,  pp.  xviii,  xxiii.  Our  only  notion  of 
the  date  of  the  expedition  is  derived  from  Pliny, 
Hist.  Nat.,  v.  i.  § 7,  who  says:  “ Fuere  et 

Hannonis  Carthaginiensium  ducis  commentarii, 
Punicis  rebus  florentissimis  explorare  ambitum 
Africae  jussi.”  All  that  is  known  of  Plimilko 
is  derived  from  the  statement  of  Pliny,  Hist. 
Nat.,  ii.  67,  that  he  was  sent  at  about  the  same 
time  as  Hanno  to  explore  the  distant  regions  of 
Europe  ; and  from  the  poems  of  Avienus,  who 
wrote  in  the  fourth  century,  and  professed  to 
give,  in  the  Ora  Maritima,  many  extracts  from 
the  writings  of  Himilko.  The  description  of 
the  difficulties  of  navigation  in  the  Atlantic  is 


"best  known.  In  his  Deutsche  Alterthumskunde 
(Berlin,  1870),  i.  pp.  73-210,  Muellenhof  has  de- 
voted especial  attention  to  an  analysis  of  this 
record. 

3  Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.,  vi.  36,  37;  Mela,  iii.  100, 
etc. ; Solinus,  23,  56  [ed.  Mommsen,  p.  117,  230]  ; 
Ptolemy,  Geogr.,  iv.  6 ; Rapport  stir  une  mission 
scientifique  dans  I'archipel  Canarienne,  par  M.  le 
docteur  Verneau  ; 1877.  In  Archives  des  Mis- 
sions Scientifique  et  Litteraires,  3e  serie,  tom.  xiii. 
pp.  569,  etc.  The  presence  of  Semites  is  indi- 
cated in  Gran  Canaria,  Ferro,  Palma,  and  the 
inscriptions  agree  in  character  with  those  found 
in  Numidia  by  Gen.  Faidherbe.  In  Gomeraand 
Teneriffe,  where  the  Guanche  stock  is  purest, 
there  have  been  no  inscriptions  found.  Dr. 
Verneau  believes  that  the  Guanches  are  not  de- 
scended from  Atlantes  or  Americans,  but  from 
the  Quaternary  men  of  Cro-magnon  on  the 
Vezere ; he  found,  however,  traces  of  an  un- 
known brachvcephalic  race  in  Gomera. 


26 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


followed,  for  we  find  Pindar  and  his  successors  referring  to  the  Pillars  as 
the  limit  of  navigation.  In  600  b.  c.,  Massilia  was  founded,  and  soon 
became  a rival  of  Carthage  in  the  western  Mediterranean.  In  the  fourth 
century  we  have  evidence  of  an  attempt  to  search  out  the  secrets  of  the 
ocean  after  the  manner  of  Hanno  and  Himilko.  In  that  century,  Pytheas 
made  his  famous  voyage  to  the  lands  of  tin  and  amber,  discovering  the 
still  mysterious  Thule  ; while  at  the  same  time  his  countryman  Euthy- 
menes  sailed  southward  to  the  Senegal.  With  these  exceptions  we  hear 
of  no  Grecian  or  Roman  explorations  in  the  Atlantic,  and  meet  with  no 
indication  that  they  were  aware  of  any  other  lands  beyond  the  sea  than 
the  Fortunate  Isles  or  the  Hesperides  of  the  early  poets.1 

About  80  b.  c.,  Sertorius,  being  for  a time  driven  from  Spain  by  the 
forces  of  Sulla,  fell  in,  when  on  an  expedition  to  Baetica,  with  certain 


sailors  who  had  just  returned  from 

1 In  the  second  century,  A.  D.,  Pausanias 
( Desc . Graee.,  i.  23)  was  told  by  Euphemus,  a 
Carian,  that  once,  on  a voyage  to  Italy,  he  had 
been  driven  to  the  sea  outside  [es  tV  6d\a<r- 
oav],  where  people  no  longer  sailed,  and  where 
he  fell  in  with  many  desert  islands,  some  inhab- 
ited by  wild  men,  red-haired,  and  with  tails, 
whom  the  sailors  called  Satyrs.  Nothing  more  is 
known  of  these  islands.  ’,E|ai  has  here  been  ren- 
dered simply  “ distant  ” ; but  even  in  this  sense 
it  could  hardly  apply  in  the  time  of  Pausanias  to 
any  region  but  the  Atlantic.  It  is  more  proba- 
ble that  the  phrase  means  “ outside  the  columns.” 

In  the  first  century  B.  C.,  some  men  of  an  un- 
known race  were  cast  by  the  sea  on  the  German 
coast.  There  is  nothing  to  show  that  these  men 
were  American  Indians  ; but  since  that  has  been 
sometimes  assumed,  the  matter  should  not  be 
passed  over  here.  The  event  is  mentioned  by 
Mela  {De  Chorogr.,  iii.  5,  § 8),  and  by  Pliny  [Hist. 
Nat.,  ii.  67) ; the  castaways  were  forwarded  to 
the  proconsul,  Q.  Caecilius  Metellus  Celer  (b.  c. 
62),  by  the  king  of  the  tribe  within  whose  terri- 
tory they  were  found.  Pliny  calls  the  tribe  the 
Suevi ; the  reading  in  Mela  is  very  uncertain. 
Parthey  has  Botorum,  the  older  editors  Baeto- 
rum,  or  Boiorum.  The  Romans  took  them  for 
inhabitants  of  India,  who  had  been  carried 
around  the  north  of  Europe ; modern  writers 
have  seen  in  them  Africans,  Celts,  Lapps,  or 
Caribs.  A careful  study  of  the  whole  subject, 
with  references  to  the  literature,  will  be  found 
in  an  article  by  F.  Schiern : Un  enigme  ethno- 
graphique  de  I’antiquite , contributed  to  the  Me- 
moirs of  the  Royal  Society  of  Northern  Antiqua- 
ries, New  Series,  1878-83,  pp.  245-288. 

In  the  Louvre  is  an  antique  bronze  which  has 
been  thought  to  represent  one  of  the  Indians  of 
Mela,  and  also  to  be  a good  reproduction  of  the 
features  of  the  North  American  Indian  (Long- 
perier,  Notice  des  bronzes  antiques,  etc.,  du  A/usee 


the  "Atlantic  islands,”  which  they 

du  Louvre,  Paris,  1868,  p.  143),  but  the  supposi- 
tion is  purely  arbitrary. 

Such  an  event  as  an  involuntary  voyage  from 
the  West  Indies  to  the  shores  of  Europe  is  not 
an  impossibility,  nor  is  the  case  cited  by  Mela 
and  Pliny  the  only  one  of  the  kind  which  we  find 
recorded.  Gomara  (Hist.  gen.  de  las  Jtidias,  7) 
says  some  savages  were  thrown  upon  the  Ger- 
man coast  in  the  reign  of  Frederic  Barbarossa 
(1152-1190),  and  Aeneas  Silvius  (Pius  II.)  prob- 
ably refers  to  the  same  event  when  he  quotes  a 
certain  Otho  as  relating  the  capture  on  the  coast 
of  Germany,  in  the  time  of  the  German  empe- 
rors, of  an  Indian  ship  and  Indian  traders  (mer- 
catores).  The  identity  of  Otho  is  uncertain. 
Otto  of  Freisingen  (t  1158)  is  probably  meant, 
but  the  passage  does  not  appear  in  his  works 
that  have  been  preserved  (Aeneas  Silvius,  His- 
toria  rerum , ii.  8,  first  edition,  Venice,  1477). 
The  most  curious  story,  however,  is  that  related 
by  Cardinal  Bembo  in  his  history  of  Venice  (first 
published  1551 7,  and  quoted  by  Horn  ( De  orig. 
Amer.,  14),  Garcia  (iv.  29),  and  others.  It  de- 
serves, however,  record  here.  “A  French  ship 
while  cruising  in  the  ocean  not  far  from  Britain 
picked  up  a little  boat  made  of  split  oziers  and 
covered  with  bark  taken  whole  from  the  tree; 
in  it  were  seven  men  of  moderate  height,  rather 
dark  complexion,  broad  and  open  faces,  marked 
with  a violet  scar.  They  had  a garment  of  fish- 
skin  with  spots  of  divers  shades,  and  wore  a 
headgear  of  painted  straw,  interwoven  with  seven 
things  like  ears,  as  it  were  (coronam  e culmo 
pictam  septem  quasi  auriculis  intextam).  They 
ate  raw  flesh,  and  drank  blood  as  we  wine.  Their 
speech  could  not  be  understood.  Six  of  them 
died ; one,  a youth,  was  brought  alive  to  Roano 
(so  the  Italian ; the  Latin  has  Aulercos),  where 
the  king  was”  (Louis  XII.).  Bembo,  Rerum 
Venetarum  Hist.  vii.  year,  1508.  [Opere,  Venice; 
1729,  i.  188.] 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


2 7 


described  as  two  in  number,  distant  10,000  stadia  from  Africa,  and  enjoy- 
ing a wonderful  climate.  The  account  in  Plutarch  is  quite  consistent  with 
a previous  knowledge  of  the  islands,  even  on  the  part  of  Sertorius.  Be 
this  as  it  may,  the  glowing  praises  of  the  eye-witnesses  so  impressed  him 
that  only  the  unwillingness  of  his  followers  prevented  his  taking  refuge 
there.  Within  the  next  few  years,  the  Canaries,  at  least,  became  well 
known  as  the  Fortunatae  Insulae ; but  when  Horace,  in  the  dark  days  of 
civil  war,  urged  his  countrymen  to  seek  a new  home  across  the  waves,  it 
was  apparently  the  islands  of  Sertorius  that  he  had  in  mind,  regarding 
them  as  unknown  to  other  peoples.1 

As  we  trace  the  increasing  volume  and  extent  of  commerce  from  the 
days  of  Tyre  and  Carthage  and  Alexandria  to  its  fullest  development  under 
the  empire,  and  remember  that  as  the  drafts  of  luxury-loving  Rome  upon 
the  products  of  the  east,  even  of  China  and  farther  India,  increased,  the 
true  knowledge  of  the  form  of  the  earth,  and  the  underestimate  of  the 
breadth  of  the  western  ocean,  became  more  widely  known,  the  question 
inevitably  suggests  itself,  Why  did  not  the  enterprise  which  had  long  since 
utilized  the  monsoons  of  the  Indian  Ocean  for  direct  passage  to  and  from 
India  essay  the  passage  of  the  Atlantic  ? The  inquiry  gains  force  as  we  re- 
call that  the  possibility  of  such  a route  to  India  had  been  long  ago  asserted. 
Aristotle  suggested,  if  he  did  not  express  it ; Eratosthenes  stated  plainly 
that  were  it  not  for  the  extent  of  the  Atlantic  it  would  be  possible  to  sail 
from  Spain  to  India  along  the  same  parallel;2  and  Strabo  could  object 
nothing  but  the  chance  of  there  being  another  island-continent  or  two  in 
the  way, — an  objection  unknown  to  Columbus.  Seneca,  the  philosopher, 
iterating  insistence  upon  the  smallness  of  the  earth  and  the  pettiness  of  its 
affairs  compared  with  the  higher  interests  of  the  soul,  exclaims  : “ The 
earth,  which  you  so  anxiously  divide  by  fire  and  sword  into  kingdoms,  is  a 
point,  a mere  point,  in  the  universe.  . . . How  far  is  it  from  the  utmost 
shores  of  Spain  to  those  of  India  ? But  very  few  days’  sail  with  a favoring 
wind.”  3 


1 Nos  manet  Oceanus  circumvagus ; arva,  beata 
Petamus  arva,  divites  et  insulas, 

Reddit  ubi  Cererem  tellus  inarata  quotannis 
Et  inputata  floret  usque  vinea. 

Non  hue  Argoo  contendit  remige  pinus, 

Neque  inpudica  Colchis  intulit  pedem  ; 

Non  hue  Sidonii  torserunt  cornua  nautae , 

Laboriosa  nec  cohors  Ulixei. 

Juppiter  ilia  piae  secrevit  litora  genti, 

Ut  inquinavit  aere  tempus  aureum  ; 

Aere,  dehinc  ferro  duravit  saecula,  quorum 
Piis  secunda,  vate  me,  datur  fuga. 

(Horace,  Efode,  xvi.) 

Virgil,  in  the  well-known  lines  in  the  prophecy 
of  Anchises  — 

Super  et  Garamantes  et  Indos 

Proferet  inperium  ; iacet  extra  sidera  tellus, 

Extra  anni  solisque  vias,  ubi  caelifer  Atlas 
Axem  humero  torquet  stellis  ardentibus  aptum  — 

(r Eticid , vi.  795.) 


had  Africa  rather  than  the  west  in  mind,  accord- 
ing to  the  commentators. 

It  is  possible  that  the  islands  described  to 
Sertorius  were  Madeira  and  Porto  Santo,  but 
the  distance  was  much  overestimated  in  this 
case. 

2 “ He  [Eratosthenes]  says  that  if  the  extent 
of  the  Atlantic  Ocean  were  not  an  obstacle,  we 
might  easily  pass  by  sea  from  Iberia  to  India, 
still  keeping  in  the  same  parallel,  the  remaining 
portion  of  which  parallel  . . . occupies  more 
than  a third  of  the  whole  circle.  . . . But  it  is 
quite  possible  that  in  the  temperate  zone  there 
may  be  two  or  even  more  habitable  earths  [ ol - 
Kovfievas],  especially  near  the  circle  of  latitude 
which  is  drawn  through  Athens  and  the  Atlantic 
ocean.”  (Strabo,  Geogr .,  i.  4,  § 6.) 

3 Seneca,  Naturalium  Quaest.  Praefatio.  The 


28 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Holding  these  views  of  the  possibility  of  the  voyage,  it  is  improbable 
that  the  size  of  their  ships  and  the  lack  of  the  compass  could  have  long 
prevented  the  ancients  from  putting  them  in  practice  had  their  interest  so 
demanded.1  Their  interest  in  the  matter  was,  however,  purely  speculative, 
since,  under  the  unity  and  power  of  the  Roman  empire,  which  succeeded 
to  and  absorbed  the  commercial  supremacy  of  the  Phoenicians,  international 
competition  in  trade  did  not  exist,  nor  were  the  routes  of  trade  subject  to 
effective  hostile  interruption.  The  two  causes,  therefore,  which  worked 
powerfully  to  induce  the  voyages  of  Da  Gama  and  Columbus,  after  the  rise 
of  individual  states  had  given  scope  to  national  jealousy  and  pride,  and 
after  the  fall  of  Constantinople  had  placed  the  last  natural  gateway  of  the 
eastern  trade  in  the  hands  of  Arab  infidels,  were  non-existent  under  the 
older  civilization.  It  is  certain,  too,  that  the  ancients  had  a vivid  horror  of 
the  western  ocean.  In  the  Odyssey,  the  western  Mediterranean  even  is 
full  of  peril.  With  knowledge  of  the  ocean,  the  Greeks  received  tales  of 
“ Gorgons  and  Chimeras  dire,”  and  the  very  poets  who  sing  the  beauties 
of  the  Elysian  or  Hesperian  isles  dwell  on  the  danger  of  the  surround- 
ing sea.  Beyond  Gades,  declared  Pindar,  no  man,  however  brave,  could 
pass ; only  a god  might  voyage  those  waters.  The  same  idea  recurs  in 
the  reports  of  travellers  and  the  writings  of  men  of  science,  but  here  it 
is  the  storms,  or  more  often  the  lack  of  wind,  the  viscid  water  or  vast 
shoals,  that  check  and  appall  the  mariner.  Aristotle  thought  that  beyond 
the  columns  the  sea  was  shallow  and  becalmed.  Plato  utilized  the  common 
idea  of  the  mud-banks  and  shoal  water  of  the  Atlantic  in  accounting  for 
the  disappearance  of  Atlantis.  Scylax  reported  the  ocean  not  navigable 
beyond  Cerne  in  the  south,  and  Pytheas  heard  that  beyond  Thule  sea  and 
air  became  confounded.  Even  Tacitus  believed  that  there  was  a peculiar 
resistance  in  the  waters  of  the  northern  ocean.2 

Whether  the  Greeks  owed  this  dread  to  the  Phoenicians,  and  whether  the 
latter  shared  the  feeling,  or  simulated  and  encouraged  it  for  the  purpose  of 
concealing  their  profitable  adventures  beyond  the  Straits,  is  doubtful.  In 
two  cases,  at  least,  it  is  possible  to  trace  statements  of  this  nature  to  Punic 


passage  is  certainly  striking,  but  those  who,  like 
Baron  Zach,  base  upon  it  the  conclusion  that 
American  voyagers  were  common  in  the  days  of 
Seneca  overestimate  its  force.  It  is  certainly 
evident  that  Seneca,  relying  on  his  knowledge  of 
theoretical  geography,  underestimated  the  dis- 
tance to  India.  Had  the  length  of  the  voyage  to 
America  been  known,  he  would  not  have  used 
the  illustration. 

1 Smaller  vessels  even  than  were  then  afloat 
hare  crossed  the  Atlantic,  and  the  passage  from 
the  Canaries  is  hardly  more  difficult  than  the 
Indian  navigation.  The  Pacific  islanders  make 
voyages  of  days’  duration  by  the  stars  alone  to 
goals  infinitely  smaller  than  the  broadside  of 
Asia,  to  which  the  ancients  would  have  supposed 
themselves  addressed. 


2 Aristotle,  Meteorolog.,  ii.  I,  § 14  ; Plato,  Ti- 
maeus  ; Scylax  Caryandensis,  Periplus,  112.  rrjs 
Kepnjs  $e  vi]<rov  ra  eireKfiva  oukIti  iarl  irAaira  Sick 
fipaxvTriTa  da\aTTT)s  Kal  irt]\bv  Kal  ipvKos  ( Gcogr. 
Graec.  minted.  Mueller,  i.  93;  other  references 
in  the  notes).  Pytheas  in  Strabo,  ii.  4,  § 1 ; Taci- 
tus, Germania , 45,  1 ; Agricola , x.  A gloss  to 
Suidas  applies  the  name  Atlantic  to  all  innavi- 
gable seas.  Pausanias,  i.  ch.  3,  § 6,  says  it  con- 
tained strange  sea-beasts,  and  was  not  navigable 
in  its  more  distant  parts.  A long  list  of  refer- 
ences to  similar  passages  is  given  by  Ukert, 
Geogr.  der  Griechen  u.  Romer,  ii.  1,  p.  59.  See 
also  Berger,  Wissenschaftliche  Geographic , i.  p. 
27,  note  3,  and  Grote,  Hist,  of  Greece , iii.  ch.  18, 
notes. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


29 


sources,  and  antiquity  agreed  in  giving  the  Phoenicians  credit  for  discour- 
aging rivalry  by  every  art.1 

To  an  age  averse  to  investigation  for  its  own  sake,  ignorant  of  scientific 
curiosity,  and  unimpelled  by  economic  pressure,  tales  like  these  might  seem 
decisive  against  an  attempt  to  sail  westward  to  India.  Rome  could  thor- 
oughly appreciate  the  imaginative  mingling  of  science  and  legend  which 
vivified  the  famous  prophecy  of  the  poet  Seneca  : 

Venient  annis  saecula  seris 
Quibus  Oceanus  vincula  rerum 
Laxet,  et  ingens  patebit  tellus 
Tethysque  novos  deteget  orbes 
Nec  sit  terris  ultima  Thule.2 


But  even  were  it  overlooked  that  the  prophecy  suited  better  the  reve- 
lation of  an  unknown  continent,  such  as  the  theory  of  Crates  and  Cicero 
placed  between  Europe  and  Asia,  than  the  discovery  of  the  eastern  coast  of 
India,  mariners  and  merchants  might  be  pardoned  if  they  set  the  deterrent 
opinions  collected  by  the  elder  Seneca  above  the  livelier  fancies  of  his  son.3 

The  scanty  records  of  navigation  and  discovery  in  the  western  waters 
confirm  the  conclusions  drawn  from  the  visions  of  the  poets  and  the  theo- 
ries of  the  philosophers.  No  evidence  from  the  classic  writers  justifies  the 
assumption  that  the  ancients  communicated  with  America.  If  they  guessed 
at  the  possibility  of  such  a continent,  it  was  only  as  we  to-day  imagine  an 
antarctic  continent  or  an  open  polar  sea.  Evidence  from  ethnological  com- 


1  De  Mirab . A u scull.,  136.  The  Phoenicians 
are  said  to  have  discovered  beyond  Gades  ex- 
tensive shoals  abounding  in  fish. 

Quae  Himilco  Poenus  mensibus  vix  quatuor, 

Ut  ipse  semet  re  probasse  retulit 
Enavigantem,  posse  transmitti  adserit : 

Sic  nulla  late  flabra  propellunt  ratem, 

Sic  segnis  humor  aequoris  pigri  stupet. 

Adjecit  et  illud,  plurimum  inter  gurgites 
Extare  fucum,  et  saepe  virgulti  vice 
Retinere  puppim  : dicit  hie  nihilominus, 

Non  in  profundum  terga  dimitti  maris, 

Parvoque  aquarum  vix  supertexi  solum : 

Obire  semper  hue  et  hue  ponti  feras, 

Navigia  lenta  et  languide  repentia 
Internatare  belluas. 

(Avienus,  Ora  Maritima , 1 15-130.) 
Hunc  usus  olim  dixit  Oceanum  vetus, 

Alterque  dixit  mos  Atlanticum  mare. 

Longo  explicatur  gurges  hujus  ambitu, 

Produciturque  latere  prolixe  vago. 

Plerumque  porro  tenue  tenditur  salum, 

Ut  vix  arenas  subjacentes  occulat. 

Exsuperat  autem  gurgitem  fucus  frequens, 

Atque  impeditur  aestus  hie  uligine  : 

Vis  belluarum  pelagus  omne  internatat, 

Multusque  terror  ex  feris  habitat  freta. 

Haec  olim  Himilcos  Poenus  Oceano  super 
Spectasse  semet  et  probasse  retulit : 

Haec  nos,  ab  imis  Punicorum  annalibus 

Prolata  longo  tempore,  edidimus  tibi.  {Ibid.  402-415.) 

Whether  Avienus  had  immediate  knowledge 
of  these  Punic  sources  is  quite  unknown. 


2 Seneca,  Medea , 376-380. 

3 In  the  first  book  of  his  Suasoricz,  M.  An- 
naeus Seneca  collected  a number  of  examples 
illustrative  of  the  manner  in  which  several  of 
the  famous  orators  and  rhetoricians  of  his  time 
had  handled  the  subject,  Deliberat  Alexander, 
an  Oceanum  navi  get,  which  appears  to  have  been 
one  of  a number  of  stock  subjects  for  use  in 
rhetorical  training.  This  collection  thus  gives 
a good  view  of  the  prevalent  views  about  the 
ocean,  and  certainly  tells  strongly  against  the  idea 
that  the  western  passage  was  then  known  or  prac- 
tised. “ Fertiles  in  Oceano  jacere  terras,  ultra- 
que  Oceanum  rursus  alia  littora,  alium  nasci 
orbem,  . . .facile  ista  finguntur ; quia  Oceanus 
tiavigari  ?ion  potest . . . confusa  lux  alta  caligine, 
et  interceptus  tenebris  dies,  ipsum  veros  grave  et 
devium  mare,  et  aut  nulla,  aut  ignota  sidera.  Ita 
est,  Alexander,  rerum  natura ; post  omnia  Ocea- 
nus, post  Oceanum  nihil.  . . . Immensum,  et  hu- 
manae  intentatum  experientiae  pelagus,  totius 
orbis  vinculum,  terrarumque  custodia,  inagitata 
remigio  vastitas.  . . . Fabianus  . . . divisit  enim 
illam  [quaestionem]  sic,  ut  primurn  negaret  ullas 
in  Oceano,  aut  trans  Oceanum,  esse  terras  habi- 
tabiles  : deinde  si  essent,  perveniri  tamen  ad  il- 
las  non  posse.  Hie  difficultatem  ignoti  maris. 
naturam  non  patientem  navigationis.” 


30 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


parisons  is  of  course  admissible,  but  those  who  are  best  fitted  to  handle 
such  evidence  best  know  its  dangers  ; hitherto  its  use  has  brought  little  but 
discredit  to  the  cause  in  which  it  was  invoked. 

The  geographical  doctrines  which  antiquity  bequeathed  to  the  Middle 
Ages  were  briefly  these  : that  the  earth  was  a sphere  with  a circumference 
of  252,000  or  180,000  stadia;  that  only  the  temperate  zones  were  inhabita- 
ble, and  the  northern  alone  known  to  be  inhabited  ; that  of  the  southern, 
owing  to  the  impassable  heats  of  the  torrid  zone,  it  could  not  be  discovered 
whether  it  were  inhabited,  or  whether,  indeed,  land  existed  there ; and  that 


of  the  northern,  it  was  unknown  whether  the  intervention  of  another  con- 
tinent, or  only  the  shoals  and  unknown  horrors  of  the  ocean,  prevented  a 
westward  passage  from  Europe  to  Asia.  The  legatee  preserved,  but  did 
not  improve  his  inheritance.  It  has  been  supposed  that  the  early  Middle 
Ages,  under  the  influence  of  barbarism  and  Christianity,  ignored  the  sphe- 
ricity of  the  earth,  deliberately  returning  to  the  assumption  of  a plane  sur- 
face, either  wheel-shaped  or  rectangular.  That  knowledge  dwindled  after 
the  fall  of  the  empire,  that  the  early  church  included  the  learning  as  well 
as  the  religion  of  the  pagans  in  its  ban,  is  undeniable ; but  on  this  point 
truth  prevailed.  It  was  preserved  by  many  school-books,  in  many  popular 

*'  Sketched  in  the  Bollettino  della  Societh  geografica  italiana  (Roma,  1882),  p.  540,  from  the  original  in 
the  Biblioteca  Medicea  Laurenziana  in  Florence.  The  representation  of  this  sketch  of  the  earth  by  Cosmas 
Indicopleustes  more  commonly  met  with  is  from  the  engraving  in  the  edition  of  Cosmas  in  Montfaucon’s 
Collectio  nova  pat  rum,  Pairis,  1706.  The  article  by  Marinelli  which  contains  the  sketch  given  here  has  also 
appeared  separately  in  a German  translation  ( Die  Erdkunde  bei  den  KirchenVatern,  Leipzig,  1884).  The 
continental  land  beyond  the  ocean  should  be  noticed. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


31 


compilations  from  classic  authors,  and  was  accepted  by  many  ecclesiastics. 
St.  Augustine  did  not  deny  the  sphericity  of  the  earth.  It  was  assumed 
by  Isidor  of  Seville,  and  taught  by  Bede.1  The  schoolmen  buttressed  the 
doctrine  by  the  authority  of  Aristotle  and  the  living  science  which  the  Arabs 
built  upon  the  Almagest.  Gerbert,  Albert  the  Great,  Roger  Bacon,  Dante, 
were  as  familiar  with  the  idea  of  the  earth-globe  as  were  Hipparchus  and 
Ptolemy.  The  knowledge  of  it  came  to  Columbus  not  as  an  inspiration  or 
an  invention,  but  by  long,  unbroken  descent  from  its  unknown  Grecian,  or 
pre-Grecian,  discoverer. 

As  to  the  distribution  of  land  and  water,  the  oceanic  theory  of  Crates,  as 
expounded  by  Macrobius,  prevailed  in  the  west,  although  the  existence  of 
antipodes  fell  a victim  to  the  union,  in  the  ecclesiastic  mind,  of  the  heathen 
theory  of  an  impassable  torrid  zone  with  the  Christian  teaching  of  the  de- 
scent of  all  men  from  Adam.2  The  discoveries  made  by  the  ancients  in  the 
ocean,  of  the  Canaries  and  other  islands  known  to  them,  were  speedily  for- 
gotten, while  their  geographic  myths  were  superseded  by  a ranker  growth. 
The  Saturnian  continent,  Meropis,  Atlantis,  the  Fortunate  Isles,  the  Hes- 
perides,  were  relegated  to  the  dusty  realm  of  classical  learning ; but  the 
Atlantic  was  not  barren  of  their  like.  Mediaeval  maps  swarmed  with  fabu- 
lous islands,  and  wild  stories  of  adventurous  voyages  divided  the  attention 
with  tales  of  love  and  war.  Antiilia  was  the  largest,  and  perhaps  the  most 
famous,  of  these  islands  ; it  was  situated  in  longitude  330°  east,  and  near 
the  latitude  of  Lisbon,  so  that  Toscanelli  regarded  it  as  much  facilitating 
the  plan  of  Columbus.  Well  known,  too,  was  Bratpr,  or  Brazil,  having  its 
proper  position  west  and  north  of  Ireland,  but  often  met  with  elsewhere  ; 
both  this  island  and  Antiilia  afterward  gave  names  to  portions  of  the  new 
continent.3 

Antiilia,  otherwise  called  the  Island  of  Seven  Cities,  was  discovered  and 
settled  by  an  archbishop  and  six  bishops  of  Spain,  who  fled  into  the  ocean 
after  the  victory  of  the  Moors,  in  714,  over  Roderick;  it  is  even  reported 
to  have  been  rediscovered  in  1447.*  Mayda,  Danmar,  Man  Satanaxio,  Isla 
Verde,  and  others  of  these  islands,  of  which  but  little  is  known  beside  the 
names,  appear  for  the  first  time  upon  the  maps  of  the  fourteenth  and  fif- 
teenth centuries,  but  their  origin  is  quite  unknown.  It  might  be  thought 
that  they  were  derived  from  confused  traditions  of  their  classical  prede- 


1 Virgil,  bishop  of  Salzburg,  was  accused  be- 
fore Pope  Zacharias  by  St.  Boniface  of  teaching 
the  doctrine  of  antipodes  ; for  this,  and  not  for 
his  belief  in  the  sphericity  of  the  earth  (as  I read), 
he  was  threatened  by  the  Pope  with  expulsion 
from  the  church.  The  authority  for  this  story  is 
a letter  from  the  Pope  to  Boniface.  See  Mari- 
nelli,  Die  Erdkunde  bci  den  Kirchenvdtern , 
p.  42. 

2 Cosmas,  as  will  be  seen  in  the  cut,  adhered 

to  the  continental  theory,  placing  Paradise  on 


the  continent  in  the  east.  Paradise  was  more 
commonly  placed  in  an  island  east  of  Asia. 

8 It  has  been  suggested  by  M.  Beauvois  that 
Labrador  may  in  the  same  way  derive  its  name 
from  Inis  Labrada,  or  the  Island  of  Labraid, 
which  figures  in  an  ancient  Celtic  romance.  The 
conjecture  has  only  the  phonetic  resemblance  to 
recommend  it.  Beauvois,  L'Elysee  transatlan- 
tique  (Revue  de  l' Hi stoire  des  Religions , vii.  ( 1883 ) , 
p.  291,  n.  3). 

4 Gaffarel,  P.,  Les  isles  fatitastiques  de  I'A/lan- 
tique  au  moyen  dge,  3. 


32 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


cessors,  with  which  they  have  been  identified,  but  modern  folk-lore  has 
shown  that  such  fancies  spring  up  spontaneously  in  every  community. 
To  dream  of  a distant  spot  where  joy  is  untroubled  and  rest  unbroken  by 
grief  or  toil  is  a natural  and  inalienable  bent  of  the  human  mind.  Those 
happy  islands  which  abound  in  the  romances  of  the  heathen  Celts,  Mag 
Mell,  Field  of  Delight,  Flath  Inis,  Isle  of  the  Heroes,  the  Avallon  of  the 
Arthur  cycle,  were  but  a more  exuberant  forth-putting  of  the  same  soil 
that  produced  the  Elysian  Fields  of  Homer  or  the  terrestrial  paradise  of  the 
Hebrews.  The  later  growth  is  not  born  of  the  seed  of  the  earlier,  though 
somewhat  affected  by  alien  grafts,  as  in  the  case  of  the  famous  island  of 
St.  Brandan,  where  there  is  a curious  commingling  of  Celtic,  Greek,  and 
Christian  traditions.  It  is  dangerous,  indeed,  to  speak  of  earlier  or  later 
in  reference  to  such  myths  ; one  group  was  written  before  the  others,  but 
it  is  quite  possible  that  the  earthly  paradise  of  the  Celt  is  as  old  as  those 
of  the  Mediterranean  peoples.  The  idea  of  a phantom  or  vanishing  is- 
land, too,  is  very  old,  — as  old,  doubtless,  as  the  fact  of  fog-banks  and 
mirage,  — and  it  is  well  exemplified  in  those  mysterious  visions  which  en- 
ticed the  sailors  of  Bristol  to  many  a fruitless  quest  before  the  discovery  of 
America,  and  for  centuries  tantalized  the  inhabitants  of  the  Canaries  with 
hope  of  discovery.  The  Atlantic  islands  were  not  all  isles  of  the  blessed ; 
there  were  many  Isles  of  Demons,  such  as  Ramusio  places  north  of  New- 
foundland, a name  of  evil  report  which  afterward  attached  itself  with  more 
reason  to  Sable  Island  and  even  to  the  Bermudas : 

“ Kept,  as  suppos’d  by  Hel’s  infernal  dogs  ; 

Our  fleet  found  there  most  honest  courteous  hogs.” 1 

Not  until  the  revival  of  classical  learning  did  the  continental  system  of 
Ptolemy  reach  the  west ; the  way,  however,  had  been  prepared  for  it.  The 
measurement  of  a degree,  executed  under  the  Calif  Mamun,  seemed  to  the 
Europeans  to  confirm  the  smallest  estimate  of  the  size  of  the  earth,  which 
Ptolemy  also  had  adopted,2  while  the  travels  of  Marco  Polo,  revealing  the 
great  island  of  Japan,  exaggerated  the  popular  idea  of  the  extent  of  the 
known  world,  until  the  22 50  of  Marinus  seemed  more  probable  than  the 
i8o°  of  Ptolemy.  If,  however,  time  brought  this  shrinkage  in  the  breadth 
of  the  Atlantic,  the  temptation  to  navigators  was  opposed  by  the  belief  in 
the  dangers  of  the  ocean,  which  shared  the  persistent  life  of  the  dogma 
of  the  impassable  torrid  zone,  and  was  strongly  reinforced  by  Arab  lore. 
Their  geographers  never  tire  of  dilating  on  the  calms  and  storms,  mud- 
banks  and  fogs,  and  unknown  dangers  of  the  “ Sea  of  Darkness.  Never- 
theless, as  the  turmoil  of  mediaeval  life  made  gentler  spirits  sigh  for  peace 
in  distant  homes,  while  the  wild  energy  of  others  found  the  very  dangers 

1 Coryat’s  Crudities,  London,  1611.  Sig.  h ("4),  schel  (Geschichte  der  Geographic , p.  134),  4>000 

verso.  ells  of  540.7mm.,  the  degree  equalled  122,558.6™. 

2 The  result  of  the  Arabian  measurements  The  Europeans,  however,  thought  that  Roman 
gave  563  miles  to  a degree.  Arabian  miles  were  miles  were  meant,  and  so  got  but  83,866.6™.  to  a 
meant,  and  as  these  contain,  according  to  Pe-  degree. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


33 


of  the  sea  delightful,  there  was  opened  a double  source  of  adventures,  both 
real  and  imaginary.  Those  pillars  cut  with  inscriptions  forbidding  further 
advance  westward,  which  we  owe  to  Moorish  fancy,  confounding  Hercules 
and  Atlas  and  Alexander,  were  transformed  into  a knightly  hero  pointing 
oceanwards,  or  became  guide-posts  to  the  earthly  paradise. 

If  there  be  a legendary  flavor  in  the  flight  of  the  seven  bishops,  we 
must  set  down  the  wanderings  of  the  Magrurin1  among  the  African 
islands,  the  futile  but  bold  attempts  of  the  Visconti  to  circumnavigate  Af- 
rica, as  real,  though  without  the  least  footing  in  a list  of  claimants  for  the 
discovery  of  America.  The  voyages  of  St.  Brandan  and  St.  Malo,  again, 
are  distinctly  fabulous,  and  but  other  forms  of  the  ancient  myth  of  the 
soul-voyages ; and  the  same  may  be  said  of  the  strange  tale  of  Maelduin.2 
But  what  of  those  other  Irish  voyages  to  Irland-it-mikla  and  Huitramanna- 
land,  of  the  voyage  of  Madoc,  of  the  explorations  of  the  Zeni  ? While 
these  tales  merit  close  investigation,  it  is  certain  that  whatever  liftings  of 
the  veil  there  may  have  been  — that  there  were  any  is  extremely  doubtful 
— were  unheralded  at  the  time  and  soon  forgotten.3 

It  was  reserved  for  the  demands  of  commerce  to  reveal  the  secrets  of 
the  west.  But  when  the  veil  was  finally  removed  it  was  easy  for  men  to 
see  that  it  had  never  been  quite  opaque.  The  learned  turned  naturally  to 
their  new-found  classics,  and  were  not  slow  to  find  the  passages  which 
seemed  prophetic  of  America.  Seneca,  Virgil,  Horace,  Aristotle,  and  Theo- 
pompus,  were  soon  pressed  into  the  service,  and  the  story  of  Atlantis 
obtained  at  once  a new  importance.  I have  tried  to  show  in  this  chapter 
that  these  patrons  of  a revived  learning  put  upon  these  statements  an 
interpretation  which  they  will  not  bear. 

The  summing  up  of  the  whole  matter  cannot  be  better  given  than  in  the 
words  applied  by  a careful  Grecian  historian  to  another  question  in  ancient 
geography:  “In  some  future  time  perhaps  our  pains  may  lead  us  to  a 
knowledge  of  those  countries.  But  all  that  has  hitherto  been  written  or 
reported  of  them  must  be  considered  as  mere  fable  and  invention,  and  not 
the  fruit  of  any  real  search,  or  genuine  information.”4 


CRITICAL  ESSAY  ON  THE  SOURCES  OF  INFORMATION. 

THE  views  of  the  ancient  Mediterranean  peoples  upon  geography  are  preserved 
almost  solely  in  the  ancient  classics.  The  poems  attributed  to  Homer  and  Hesiod, 
the  so-called  Orphic  hymns,  the  odes  of  Pindar,  even  the  dramatic  works  of  ASschylus  and 
his  successors,  are  sources  for  the  earlier  time.  The  writings  of  the  earlier  philosophers 

1 Edrisi,  Geography,  Climate,  iv.,  § i,  Jau-  Relig.),  viii.  (1884),  706,  etc.;  Joyce,  Old  Celtic 
bert’s  translation,  Paris,  1836,  ii.  26.  Romances,  112-176. 

. 2 Found  in  various  Celtic  MSS.  See  Beau-  3 These  alleged  voyages  are  considered  in  the 
vois,  L' Eden  occidental  (Rev.  de  l’ Hist,  des  next  chapter. 

* Polybius,  Hist.,  iii.  38. 

VOL.  I.  — 3 


34 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


are  lost,  and  their  ideas  are  to  be  found  in  later  writers,  and  in  compilations  like  the  Biog- 
raphies of  Diogenes  Laertius  (3d  cent.  A.  d.),  the  De  placitis  philosophorum  attributed  to 
Plutarch,  and  the  like.  Among  the  works  of  Plato  the  Phaedo  and  Timaeus  and  the  last 
book  of  the  Republic  bear  on  the  form  and  arrangement  of  the  earth  ; the  Timaeus  and 
Critias  contain  the  fable  of  Atlantis.  The  first  scientific  treatises  preserved  are  the  De 
Caelo  and  Meteorologica  of  Aristotle.1  It  is  needless  to  speak  in  detail  of  the  geographical 
writers,  accounts  of  whom  will  be  found  in  any  history  of  Greek  and  Roman  literature. 
The  minor  pieces,  such  as  the  Periplus  of  Hanno,  of  Scylax  of  Caryanda,  of  Dionysius 
Periegetes,  the  Geography  of  Agatharcides,  and  others,  have  been  several  times  collected  ; 2 
and  so  have  the  minor  historians,  which  may  be  consulted  for  Theopompus,  Hecataeus, 
and  the  mythologists.3  The  geographical  works  of  Pytheas  (b.  c.  350  ?),  of  Eratosthenes 
(b.  c.  276-126),  of  Polybius  (b.  c.  204-122),  of  Hipparchus  (flor.  circ.  b.  c.  125),  of  Posido- 
nius (1st  cent.  b.  c.),  are  preserved  only  in  quotations  made  by  later  writers  ; they  have, 
however,  been  collected  and  edited  in  convenient  form.4  The  most  important  source  of 
our  knowledge  of  Greek  geography  and  Greek  geographers  is  of  course  the  great  Geo- 
graphy of  Strabo,  which  a happy  fortune  preserved  to  us.  The  long  introduction  upon 
the  nature  of  geography  and  the  size  of  the  earth  and  the  dimensions  of  the  known  world 
is  of  especial  interest,  both  for  his  own  views  and  for  those  he  criticises.5  Strabo  lived 
about  B.  c.  60  to  A.  d.  24. 

The  works  of  Marinus  of  Tyre  having  perished,  the  next  important  geographical  work 
in  Greek  is  the  world-renowned  Geography  of  Ptolemaeus,  who  wrote  in  the  second  half 
of  the  second  century  a.  d.  Despite  the  peculiar  merits  and  history  of  this  work,  it  is  not 
so  important  for  our  purpose  as  the  work  of  Strabo,  though  it  exercised  infinitely  more 
influence  on  the  Middle  Ages  and  on  early  modern  geography.6 


1 The  tract  On  the  World  (irepl  Klopov,  de 
mundo),  and  the  Strange  Stories  [irepl  Qavpaoioiv 
aKovoparwr,  de  mirabilibus  auscultationibus), 
printed  with  the  works  of  Aristotle,  are  held  to 
be  spurious  by  critics  : the  forrher,  which  gives  a 
good  summary  of  the  oceanic  theory  of  the  dis- 
tribution of  land  and  water  (ch.  3),  is  consider- 
ably later  in  date  ; the  latter  is  a compilation 
made  from  Aristotle  and  other  writers.  Muel- 
lenhof  has  sought  partially  to  analyze  it  in  his 
Deutsche  Alterthumskunde,  i.  426,  etc. 

2 First  in  Geographica  Marciani,  Scylacis,  Ar- 

temidoris , Dicaarchi,  Isidori.  Ed.  a Hoeschelio 
(Aug.  Vind.,  1600).  The  great  collection  made 
by  Hudson,  Geographiae  veter is  scriptores  Graeci 
minores  (4  vols.,  Oxon.,  1698-1712;  re-edited  by 
Gail,  Paris,  1826,  6 vols.),  is  still  useful,  notwith- 
standing the  handy  edition  by  C.  Mueller  in 
the  Didot  classics,  Geographiae  Graeci  minores 
(Paris,  1855-61.  2 vols.  and  atlas). 

3 Fragmenta  historicorum  Graecorum.  Ed.  C. 
el  T.  Mueller  (Paris,  Didot,  1841-68.  5 vols.). 

4 Die  geographischen  Fragmente  des  Hippar- 
chus : H.  Berger  (Leipzig,  1869) ; Posidonii Rhodii 
reliquiae  doctrinae : coll.  J.  Bake  (Lugd.  Bat., 
1810)  ; Eratosthenica  composuit  G.  Bernhardy 
(Berlin,  1822) ; Die  geographischen  Fragmente  des 
Eratosthenes : H.  Berger  (Leipzig,  1880). 

5 Strabonis  Geographia  (Romae,  Suweynheym 
et  Pannartz,  s.  a.),  in  1469  or  1470,  folio. 
First  edition  of  the  Latin  translation  which  was 
made  by  Guarini  of  Verona,  and  Lilius  Grego- 
rius of  Tiferno  ; only  275  copies  were  printed. 


It  was  reprinted  in  1472  (Venice),  1473  (Rome), 
1480  (Tarvisii),  1494  (Venice),  1502  (Venice), 
1510  (Venice),  and  1512  (Paris).  Strabo  de  situ 
orbis  (Venice.  Aldus  et  Andr.  Soc.,  1516),  fob, 
was  the  first  Greek  edition ; a better  edition  ap- 
peared in  1549  (Basil.,  fob),  with  Guarini’s  and 
Gregorius’s  translation  revised  by  Glareanus 
and  others.  Critical  ed.  by  J.  Kramer  (Berlin, 
1844),  3 vols.  Ed.  with  Latin  trans.  by  C. 
Miiller  and  F.  Diibner  (Paris,  Didot,  1853,  1857). 
It  has  since  been  edited  by  August  Meineke 
(Leipsic,  Teubner,  1866.  3 vols.  8vo). 

There  was  an  Italian  translation  by  Buonac- 
ciuoli,  in  Venice  and  Ferrara,  1562,  1585.  2 vols. 
The  Veuypa<piKa  has  been  several  times  trans- 
lated into  German,  by  Penzel  (Lemgo,  177 5 — 
1777,  4 Bde.  8vo),  Groskund  fBerlin,  Stettin, 
1831-1834.  4 Thle.),  and  Forbiger  (Stuttgart, 

1856-1862.  2 Bde.),  and  very  recently  into  Eng- 
lish by  H.  C.  Hamilton  and  W.  Falconer  (Lon- 
don, Bell  [Bohn],  1887).  3 vols.  This  has  a 

useful  index. 

The  great  French  translation  of  Strabo,  made 
by  order  of  Napoleon,  with  very  full  notes  by 
Gosselin  and  others,  is  still  the  most  useful  trans- 
lation : Geographic  du  Strabon  trad,  du  grcc  cn 
franqaise  (Paris,  1805-1819).  5 vols.  4to. 

6  The  Geography  was  first  printed,  in  a Latin 
translation,  at  Vincentia,  in  1475;  date 
in  the  Bononia  edition  being  recognized  as  a 
misprint,  probably  for  1482.  The  history  of  the 
book  has  been  described  by  Lelewel  in  the  appen- 
dix to  his  Histoire  de  la  Geographic , and  more 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


35 


The  astronomical  writers  are  also  of  importance.  Eudoxus  of  Cnidus,  said  to  have  first 
adduced  the  change  in  the  altitude  of  stars  accompanying  a change  of  latitude  as  proof 
of  the  sphericity  of  the  earth,  wrote  works  now  known  only  in  the  poems  of  Aratus, 
who  flourished  in  the  latter  half  of  the  third  century  B.  C.1  Geminus  (circ.  B.  C.  50), 2 and 
Cleomedes,3  whose  work  is  famous  for  having  preserved  the  method  by  which  Eratos- 
thenes measured  the  circumference  of  the  earth,  were  authors  of  brief  popular  compila- 
tions of  astronomical  science.  Of  vast  importance  in  the  history  of  learning  was  the 
astronomical  work  of  Ptolemy,  ^ peyaAr)  <nWa£is  t rjs  ha-rpovopias,  which  was  so  honored  by 
the  Arabs  that  it  is  best  known  to  us  as  the  Almagest , from  Tabric  al  Magisthri,  the 
title  of  the  Arabic  translation  which  was  made  in  827.  It  has  been  edited  and  trans- 
lated by  Halma  (Paris,  1813,  1816). 

Much  is  to  be  learned  from  the  Scholia  attached  in  early  times  to  the  works  of 
Hesiod,  Homer,  Pindar,  the  Argotiautica  of  Apollonius  Rhodius  (b.  c.  276-193  ?),  and 
to  the  works  of  Aristotle,  Plato,  etc.  In  some  cases  these  are  printed  with  the  works 
commented  upon ; in  other  cases,  the  Scholia  have  been  printed  separately.  The  com- 
mentary of  Proclus  (a.  d.  412-485)  upon  the  Timaeus  of  Plato  is  of  great  importance  in 
the  Atlantis  myth.4 

Much  interest  attaches  to  the  dialogue  entitled  On  the  face  appearing  in  the  orb  of  the 
moo7i,  which  appears  among  the  Moralia  of  Plutarch.  Really  a contribution  to  the 
question  of  life  after  death,  this  work  also  throws  light  upon  geographical  and  astro- 
nomical knowledge  of  its  time. 

Among  the  Romans  we  find  much  the  same  succession  of  sources.  The  poets,  Virgil, 
Horace,  Ovid,  Tibullus,  Lucretius,  Lucan,  Seneca,  touch  on  geographical  or  astronomical 
points  and  reflect  the  opinion  of  their  day.5 

The  first  six  books  of  the  great  encyclopaedia  compiled  by  Pliny  the  elder  (a.  d.  23-79)® 
contain  an  account  of  the  universe  and  the  earth,  which  is  of  the  greatest  value,  and  was 
long  exploited  by  compilers  of  later  times,  among  the  earliest  and  best  of  whom  was  Soli- 
nus.7  Equally  famous  with  Solinus  was  the  author  of  a work  of  more  independent  char- 
acter, Pomponius  Mela,  who  lived  in  the  first  century  a.  d.  His  geography,  commonly 


fully  in  Winsor’s  Bibliography  of  Ptolemy's  Geog- 
raphy (Cambridge,  Mass.,  1884),  and  in  the  sec- 
tion on  Ptolemy  by  Wilberforce  Eames  in  Sabin’s 
Dictionary , also  printed  separately. 

1 The  Phaenomena  of  Aratus  was  a poem 
which  had  great  vogue  both  in  Greece  and  Rome. 
It  was  commented  upon  by  Hipparchus  and 
Achilles  Tatius  (both  of  which  commentaries 
are  preserved,  and  are  found  in  the  Uranologion 
of  Petavius),  and  translated  by  Cicero. 

2 Gemini  clementa  astrotiomiae , also  quoted  by 
the  first  word  of  the  Greek  title,  Isagoge.  First 
edition,  Altorph,  1590.  The  best  edition  is  still 
that  in  the  Uranologion  of  Dionysius  Petavius 
(Paris,  1630).  It  is  also  found  in  the  rare  trans- 
lation of  Ptolemy  by  Halma  (Paris,  1828). 

8 Ku/cA.i/ctj  Oedipia  quoted  as  Cleom.  de  sublimibus 
circulis.  The  first  edition  was  at  Paris,  1539. 
qto.  It  has  been  edited  by  Bake  (Lugd.  Bat., 
1826),  and  Schmidt  (Leips.  1832).  Nothing  is 
known  of  the  life  of  Cleomedes.  He  wrote  after 
the  1st  cent.  A.  D.,  probably. 

4  It  was  first  printed  in  the  Plato  of  Basle, 
1 534.  There  is  an  English  translation  by  Thomas 
Taylor,  The  Commentaries  of  Proclus  on  the  Ti- 
maeus of  Plato,  in  2 vols.  (London,  1820).  P10- 

clns  was  also  the  author  of  astronomical  works 


which  helped  to  keep  Grecian  learning  alive  in 
the  early  Middle  Ages. 

5 The  works  of  L.  Annaeus  Seneca  were  first 
printed  in  Naples,  1475,  fol.,  but  the  Questionum 
naturalium  lib.  vii.  were  not  included  until  the 
Venice  ed.  of  1490,  which  also  contained  the 
first  edition  of  the  Suasoriae  and  Controversariae 
of  M.  Ann.  Seneca.  The  Tragoediae  of  L.  Ann. 
Seneca  were  first  printed- about  1484  by  A.  Gal- 
licus,  probably  at  Ferrara. 

6 Historiae  naturalis  libri  xxxvii.  The  first 
edition  was  the  famous  and  rare  folio  of  Joannes 
de  Spira,  Venice,  1469.  I find  record  of  ten 
other  editions  and  three  issues  of  Landino’s 
Italian  translation  before  1492. 

7 C.  jtulii  So/ini  Collectanea  rerum  memorabi- 
lium  sive  polyhistor.  Solinus  lived  probably  in 
the  third  century  a.  D.  His  book  was  a great 
favorite  in  the  Middle  Ages,  both  in  manuscript 
and  in  print,  and  was  known  by  various  titles,  as 
Polyhistor,  De  situ  orbis,  etc.  The  first  edition 
appeared  without  place  or  date,  at  Rome,  about 
1473,  and  in  the  same  year  at  Venice,  and  it  was 
often  reprinted  with  the  annotations  of  the  most 
famous  geographers.  The  best  edition  is  that 
by  Mommsen  (Berlin,  1864).  See  Vol.  II.  p. 
180. 


36 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


known  as  De  situ  orbis  from  the  mediaeval  title,  though  the  proper  name  is  De  chorographia , 
is  a work  of  importance  and  merit.  In  the  Middle  Ages  it  had  wonderful  popularity.1 
Cicero,  who  contemplated  writing  a history  of  geography,  touches  upon  the  arrangement 
of  the  earth’s  surface  several  times  in  his  works,  as  in  the  Tusculan  Disputations , and 
notably  in  the  sixth  book  of  the  Republic , in  the  episode  known  as  the  “ Dream  of  Scipio.” 
The  importance  of  this  piece  is  enhanced  by  the  commentary  upon  it  written  by  Macro- 
bius  in  the  fifth  century  a.  d.2  A peculiar  interest  attaches  to  the  poems  of  Avienus,  of 
the  fourth  century  A.  d.,  in  that  they  give  much  information  about  the  character  attributed 
to  the  Atlantic  Ocean.3  The  astronomical  poems  of  Manilius4 5  and  Hyginus  were  favorites 
in  early  Middle  Ages.  The  astrological  character  of  the  work  of  Manilius  made  it  popular, 
but  it  conveyed  also  the  true  doctrine  of  the  form  of  the  earth.  The  curious  work  of 
Marcianus  Capella  gave  a resume  of  science  in  the  first  half  of  the  fifth  century  a.  d.,  and 
had  a like  popularity  as  a school-book  and  house-book  which  also  helped  maintain  the 
truth.6 

Such  in  the  main  are  the  ancient  writers  upon  which  we  must  chiefly  rely  in  considering 
the  present  question.  In  the  interpretation  of  these  sources  much  has  been  done  by  the 
leading  modern  writers  on  the  condition  of  science  in  ancient  times;  like  Bunbury,  Ukert, 
Forbiger,  St.  Martin,  and  Peschel  on  geography  ; 6 like  Zeller  on  philosophy,  not  to  name 
many  others  ;7  and  like  Lewis  and  Martin  on  astronomy;8  but  there  is  no  occasion  to  go 
to  much  length  in  the  enumeration  of  this  class  of  books.  The  reader  is  referred  to 
the  examination  of  the  literature  of  special  points  of  the  geographical  studies  of  the 
ancients  to  the  notes  following  this  Essay. 


Mediaeval  cosmology  and  geography  await  a thorough  student;  they  are  imbedded  in 
the  wastes  of  theological  discussions  of  the  Fathers,  or  hidden  in  manuscript  cosmogra- 
phies in  libraries  of  Europe.  It  should  be  noted  that  confusion  has  arisen  from  the  use 
of  the  word  rotundas  to  express  both  the  sphericity  of  the  earth  and  the  circularity  of  the 


1 First  edition,  Milan,  1471.  4to.  The  best 
is  that  by  Parthey,  Berlin,  1867.  A history  and 
bibliography  of  this  work  is  given  in  Vol.  II.  p. 
180. 

2 Commentariorum  in  somnium  Scipionis  libri 
iuo.  The  first  edition  was  at  Venice,  1472. 
There  has  been  an  edition  byjahn  (2  vols. 
Quedlinburg,  1848,  1852),  and  by  Eyssenhardt 
(Leipzig,  1868),  and  a French  translation  by  va- 
rious hands,  printed  in  3 vols.  at  Paris,  1843-47. 

3 Descriptio  orbis  tcrrae  ; ora  maritima.  The 
first  edition  appeared  at  Venice  in  1488,  with 
the  Phaenomena  of  Aratus.  It  is  included  in 
the  Geogr.  Graec.  min.  of  Mueller.  Muellenhof 
has  treated  of  the  latter  poem  at  length  in  his 
Deutsche  Alterthumskunde,  i.  73-210. 

4 Astronomicon  libri  v.  Manilius  is  an  un- 
known personality,  but  wrote  in  the  first  half  of 
the  first  century  A.  D.  (First  ed.,  Nuremberg, 
1472  or  1473) ; Hyginus,  Poeticon  A stronomicon, 
1st  or  2d  cent.  A.  D.  (Ferrara,  1473). 

5 De  nuptiis  philologiae  et  Mercurii,  first  ed. 
Vicent.,  1499. 

6 E.  H.  Bunbury,  Hist,  of  Anc.  Geog.  among 
the  Greeks  and  Romans  (London,  1879),  in  two 

volumes,  — a valuable,  well-digested  work,  but 
scant  in  citations.  Ukert,  Geog.  der  Griechen 
und  Rbmer  (Weimar,  1816),  very  rich  in  cita- 
tions, giving  authorities  for  every  statement,  and 

useful  as  a summary. 


Forbiger,  Handbuch  der  alten  Geographie 
(Hamburg,  1877),  compiled  on  a peculiar  meth- 
od, which  is  often  very  sensible.  He  first  ana- 
lyzes and  condenses  the  works  of  each  writer, 
and  then  sums  up  the  opinions  on  each  country 
and  phase  of  the  subject. 

Vivien  de  St.  Martin,  Histoire  de  la  Geogra- 
phic (Paris,  1873). 

Peschel,  Geschichte  der  Erdkunde  (2d  ed.,  by 
S.  Ruge,  Miinchen,  1877).  Perhaps  reference  is 
not  out  of  place  also  to  P.  F.  J.  Gosselin’s  Geo- 
graphic des  Grecs  analysis , ou  les  Systemes  <T Era- 
tosthenes, de  Strabon  et  de  Plolemee , compares  entre 
eux  et  avec  nos  connaissances  modernes  (Paris, 
1790) ; and  his  later  Rechcrehes  sur  la  Geographie 
systimatique  et  positive  des  anciens  (1797-1813). 

Cf.  Hugo  Berger,  Geschichte  der  wiss.  Erd- 
kunde  der  Griechen  (Leipzig,  1887). 

7 Geschichte  der  Griechischen  Philosophic  (Tu- 
bingen, 1856-62). 

8 Sir  George  Cornwall  Lewis,  Historical  Sur- 
vey of  the  Astronomy  of  the  Ancients  (London, 
1862). 

Theodore  Hend  Martin,  whose  numerous  pa- 
pers are  condensed  in  the  article  on  “ Astrono- 
mie  ” in  Daremberg  and  Saglio’s  Dictionnairt 
de  PAntiquiti.  Some  of  the  more  important  dis- 
tinct papers  of  Martin  appeared  in  the  Mem. 
Acad.  Inscrip,  et  Belles  Lettres. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


37 


known  lands,  and  from  the  use  of  terra , or  orbis  terrae,  to  denote  the  inhabited  lands,  as 
well  as  the  globe.  It  has  been  pointed  out  by  Ruge  ( Gesch . d.  Zeit alters  der  Entdeckun- 
gen,  p.  97)  that  the  later  Middle  Age  adopted  the  circular  form  of  the  oekoumene  in 
consequence  of  a peculiar  theory  as  to  the  relation  of  the  land  and  water  masses  of  the 
earth,  which  were  conceived  as  two  intercepting  spheres.  The  oekoumene  might  easily 
be  spoken  of  as  a round  disk  without  implying  that  the  whole  earth  was  plane.1  That 
the  struggle  of  the  Christian  faith,  at  first  for  existence  and  then  for  the  proper  harvest- 
ing of  the  fruits  of  victory,  induced  its  earlier  defenders  to  wage  war  against  the  learning 
as  well  as  the  religion  of  the  pagans  ; that  Christians  were  inclined  to  think  time  taken 
from  the  contemplation  of  the  true  faith  worse  than  wasted  when  given  to  investigations 
into  natural  phenomena,  which  might  better  be  accepted  for  what  they  professed  to  be  ; 
and  that  they  often  found  in  Scripture  a welcome  support  for  the  evidence  of  the  senses, 
— cannot  be  denied.  It  was  inevitable  that  St.  Chrysostom,  Lactantius,  Orosius  and 
Origines  rejected  or  declined  to  teach  the  sphericity  of  the  earth.  The  curious  systems 
of  Cosmas  and  Aethicus,  marked  by  a return  to  the  crudest  conceptions  of  the  universe, 
found  some  favor  in  Europe.  But  the  truth  was  not  forgotten.  The  astronomical  poems 
of  Aratus,  Hyginus,  and  Manilius  were  still  read.  Solinus  and  other  plunderers  of  Pliny 
were  popular,  and  kept  alive  the  ancient  knowledge.  The  sphericity  of  the  earth  was  not 
denied  by  St.  Augustine  ; it  was  maintained  by  Martianus  Capella,  and  assumed  by 
Isidor  of  Seville.  Bede 2 taught  the  whole  system  of  ancient  geography;  and  but  little 
later,  Virgilius,  bishop  of  Saltzburg,  was  threatened  with  papal  displeasure,  not  for  teach- 
ing the  sphericity  of  the  earth,  but  for  upholding  the  existence  of  antipodes.3 4 *  The 
canons  of  Ptolemy  were  cited  in  the  eleventh  century  by  Hermann  Contractus  in  his  De 
utilitatibus  astrolabii,  and  in  the  twelfth  by  Hugues  de  Saint  .Victor  in  his  Eruditio 
didascalica.  Strabo  was  not  known  before  Pope  Nicholas  V.,  who  ordered  the  first 
translation.  Not  many  to-day  can  illustrate  the  truth  more  clearly  than  the  author  of 
L' Image  du  Monde , an  anonymous  poem  of  the  thirteenth  century.  If  two  men,  he  says, 
were  to  start  at  the  same  time  from  a given  point  and  go,  the  one  east,  the  other  west, — 

Si  que  andui  egaumont  alassent 

11  convendroit  qu’il  s’encontrassent 

Dessus  le  leu  dont  il  se  mdrent.4 

In  general,  the  mathematical  and  astronomical  treatises  were  earlier  known  to  the  West 
than  the  purely  metaphysical  works:  this  was  the  case  in  the  eleventh  and  twelfth  cen- 
turies; in  the  thirteenth  the  schoolmen  were  familiar  with  the  whole  body  of  Aristotle’s 
works.  Thus  the  influence  of  Aristotle  on  natural  science  was  early  important,  either 
through  Arabian  commentators  or  paraphrasers,  or  through  translations  made  from  the 
Arabic,  or  directly  from  the  Greek.6 

Jourdain  affirms  that  it  was  the  influence  of  Aristotle  and  his  interpreters  that  kept  alive 
in  the  Middle  Ages  the  doctrine  that  India  and  Spain  were  not  far  apart.  He  also  main- 


1 See  Cellarius,  Notit.  orb.  antiq.  i.  ch.  2,  de 
rotunditate  terrae.  See  also  Gunther,  Aeltere 
und  neuere  Ilypothese  ueber  die  chronische  Ver- 
setzung  des  Erdschwerpunktes  durck  IVassermas- 
sen  (Halle,  1878). 

2 De  Natura  Rcrttm. 

8 See  ante,  p.  31.  In  the  second  century  St. 
Clement  spoke  of  the  “ Ocean  impassible  to 
man,  and  the  worlds  beyond  it.”  1st  Epist.  to 
Corinth,  ch.  20.  ( Apostolic  Fathers,  Edinb.  >870, 
p.  22.) 

4 Legrand  d’Aussy,  Image  du  Monde.  Notices 
et  extraits  de  la  Bibliothique  du  Roi,  etc.,  v. 

(1798),  p.  260.  It  is  also  said  that  the  earth  is 

round,  so  that  a man  could  go  all  round  it  as  an 


insect  can  walk  all  round  the  circumference  of  a 
pear.  This  notable  poem  has  been  lately  stud- 
ied by  Fant,  but  is  still  unprinted.  It  was  known 
to  Abulfeda,  that  if  two  persons  made  the  jour- 
ney described,  they  would  on  meeting  differ  by 
two  days  in  their  calendar  (Peschel,  Gesch.  d. 
Erdkunde,  p.  132). 

6 A.  Jourdain,  Recherches  critique  sur  l' Age  et 
I origin  des  traductions  latines  d'A  ristote,  et  sur 
des  commentaires  Grecs  et  Arabes  employes  par  les 
docteurs  scolastiques  (Paris,  1843).  See  also  De 
l' influence  d'Aristote  et  de  ses  interprltes  sur  la 
dlcouverte  du  nouveau-monde,  par  Ch.  Jourdain 
(Paris,  1861). 


38 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


tains  that  the  doctrine  of  the  sphericity  of  the  earth  was  familiar  throughout  the  Middle 
Age,  and,  if  anything,  more  of  a favorite  than  the  other  view. 

The  field  of  the  later  ecclesiastical  and  scholastic  writers,  who  kept  up  the  contentions 
over  the  form  of  the  earth  and  kindred  subjects,  is  too  large  t j be  here  minutely  surveyed. 
Such  of  them  as  were  well  known  to  the  geographical  students  of  the  centuries  next  pre- 
ceding Columbus  have  been  briefly  indicated  in  another  place  ; 1 and  if  not  completely,  yet 
with  helpful  outlining,  the  whole  subject  of  the  mediaeval  cosmology  has  been  studied  by 
not  a few  of  the  geographical  and  cartographical  students  of  later  days.2  So  far  as  these 
studies  pertain  to  the  theory  of  a Lost  Atlantis  and  the  fabulous  islands  of  the  Atlantic 
Ocean,  they  will  be  particularly  illustrated  in  the  notes  which  follow  this  Essay. 


NOTES. 

A.  The  Form  of  the  Earth.  — It  is  not  easy  to  demonstrate  that  the  earliest  Greeks  believed  the  earth 
to  be  a flat  disk,  although  that  is  the  accepted  and  probably  correct  view  of  their  belief.  It  is  possible  to 
examine  but  a small  part  of  the  earliest  literature,  and  what  we  have  is  of  uncertain  date  and  dubious  origin ; 
its  intent  is  religious  or  romantic,  not  scientific;  its  form  is  poetic.  It  is  difficult  to  interpret  it  accurately, 
since  the  prevalent  ideas  of  nature  must  be  deduced  from  imagery,  qualifying  words  and  phrases,  and  seldom 
from  direct  description.  The  interpreter,  doubtful  as  to  the  proportion  in  which  he  finds  mingled  fancy  and 
honest  faith,  is  in  constant  danger  of  overreaching  himself  by  excess  of  ingenuity.  In  dealing  with  such  a 
literature  one  is  peculiarly  liable  to  abuse  the  always  dangerous  argument  by  which  want  of  knowledge  is 
inferred  from  lack  of  mention.  Other  difficulties  beset  the  use  of  later  philosophic  material,  much  of  which  is 


preserved  only  in  extracts  made  by  antagonists  or  by 

1 See  Vol.  II.,  ch.  i.,  Critical  Essay. 

3 Cf.  a bibliographical  note  in  St.  Martin’s 
Histoire  de  la  Geographic  (1873),  P-  2 96-  The 
well-known  Examen  Critique  of  Humboldt,  the 
Recherckes  sur  la  geographic  of  Walckenaer,  the 
Geographic  du  moyen-dgc  of  Lelewel,  with  a few 
lesser  monographic  papers  like  Freville’s  “ Me- 
moire  sur  la  Cosmographie  du  moyen-age,”  in 
the  Revue  des  Soc.  Savantes,  1859,  vol.  ii.,  and 
Gaffarel’s  “ Les  relations  entre  l’ancient  monde 
et  l’Amerique,  etaient-elles  possible  au  moyen- 
age,”  in  the  Bull,  de  la  Soc.  Normande  de  Ge'og., 
1881,  vol.  iii.  209,  will  answer  most  purposes  of 
the  general  reader  ; but  certain  special  phases 
will  best  be  followed  in  Letronne’s  Des  opinions 
cosmographiques  des  Plres  de  I’Eglise,  rapprocher 
des  doctrines  philosophiques  de  la  Grece,  in  the 
Revue  des  Deux  Mondes,  Mars,  1834,  p.  60:,  etc. 
The  Vicomte  Santarem’s  Essai  sur  Phistoire  de 
la  cosmographie  et  de  la  cartographic  pendant  le 
moyen-dge,  et  sur  les  progrls  de  la  geographic 
apris  les  grandes  decouvertes  du  xve  silcle  (Paris, 
1849-52),  in  3 vols.,  was  an  introduction  to  the 
great  Atlas  of  mediaeval  maps  issued  b-  Santa- 
rem,  and  had  for  its  object  the  vindication  of  the 
Portuguese  to  be  considered  the  first  explorers 
of  the  African  coast.  He  is  more  interested  in 


compilers,  so  that  we  are  forced  to  confront  a lack  of 

the  burning  zone  doctrine  than  in  the  shape  of 
the  earth.  H.  Wuttke’s  Ueber  Erdkunde  und 
Kultur  des  Mi t tela  Iters  (Leipzig,  1853)  is  an  ex- 
tract from  the  Serapeum.  G.  Marinelli’s  Die 
Erdkunde  bei  de>i  Kirchenvdtern  (Leipzig,  1884, 
pp.  87)  is  very  full  on  Cosmas,  with  drawings 
from  the  MS.  not  elsewhere  found;  Siegmund 
Gunther’s  Die  Lehre  von  der  Erdrunduug  u. 
Erdbewegung  im  Mitlelalter  bei  den  Occidentalen 
(Halle,  1877),  pp.  53,  and  his  Die  Lehre  von  der 
Erdrundung  u.  Erdbewegung  bei  den  Arabern 
und  Hebrdern  (Halle,  1877),  pp.  127,  give  numer- 
ous bibliographical  references  with  exactness. 
Specially  interesting  is  Charles  Jourdain’s  De 
V influence  d'Aristote  et  de  ses  interpr'etes  aux  la 
decouverte  du  nouveau  moiide  (Paris,  1861 ),  where 
we  read  (p.  30) : “ La  pensee  dominante  de  Co- 
lomb  etait  l’hypothese  de  la  proximite  de  l’Es- 
pagne  et  de  l’Asie,  et  . . . cette  hypothese  lui  ve- 
nait  d’A  ristote  et  des  scolastiques ; ” and  again 
(p.  24)  : “ Ce  n’est  pas  h Ptolemee  . . . que  le 
moyen  age  a emprunte  l’hypothese  d’une  commu- 
nication entre  l’Europe  et  l’Asie  par  l’ocean  At- 
lantique.  . . . Cette  consequence,  qui  n avait  par 
eschappe  a Eratosth£ne,  n’est  pas  enoncee  par 
Ptolemee  tandis  qu’elle  retrouve  de  la  maniere 
la  plus  expresse  chez  A ristote.” 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


39 


context  and  possible  misunderstanding  or  misquotation.  The  frequent  use  of  the  word  oTpoyyvAos,  which  has 
the  same  ambiguity  as  our  word  “ round  ” in  common  parlance,  often  leads  to  uncertainty.  A more  fruitful 
cause  of  trouble  is  inherent  in  the  Greek  manner  of  thinking  of  the  world.  It  is  often  difficult  to  know 
whether  a writer  means  the  planet,  or  whether  he  means  the  agglomeration  of  known  lands  which  later 
writers  called  r/  0U0 v/sivy.  It  is  not  impossible  that  when  writers  refer  to  the  earth  as  encircled  by  the  river 
Oceanus,  they  mean,  not  the  globe,  but  the  known  lands,  the  eastern  continent,  as  we  say,  what  the  Romans 
sometimes  called  orbis  terrae  or  orbis  terrarum , a term  which  may  mean  the  “ circle  of  the  lands,”  not  the 
“orb  of  the  earth.”  At  a later  time  it  was  a well-known  belief  that  the  earth-globe  and  water-globe  were 
excentrics,  so  that  a segment  of  the  former  projected  beyond  the  surface  of  the  latter  in  one  part,  and  con- 
stituted the  known  world.1 

I cannot  attach  much  importance  to  the  line  of  argument  with  which  modern  writers  since  Voss  have  tried 
to  prove  that  the  Homeric  poems  represent  the  earth  flat.  That  Poseidon,  from  the  mountains  of  the  Solymi, 
sees  Odesseus  on  the  sea  to  the  west  of  Greece  ( Od . v.  282) ; that  Helios  could  see  his  cattle  in  Thrinakia 
both  as  he  went  toward  the  heavens  and  as  he  turned  toward  the  earth  again  (Od.  xii.  380)  ; that  at  sunset 
“ all  the  ways  are  darkened  ; ” that  the  sun  and  the  stars  set  in  and  rose  from  the  ocean,  — these  and  similar 
proofs  seem  to  me  to  have  as  little  weight  as  attaches  to  the  expressions  “ ends  of  the  earth,”  or  to  the  flowing 
of  Oceanus  around  the  earth.  There  are,  however,  other  and  better  reasons  for  assuming  that  the  earth  in 
earliest  thought  was  flat.  Such  is  the  most  natural  assumption  from  the  evidence  of  sight,  and  there  is 
certainly  nothing  in  the  older  writings  inconsistent  with  such  an  idea.  We  know,  moreover,  that  in  the  time 
of  Socrates  it  was  yet  a matter  of  debate  as  to  whether  the  earth  was  flat  or  spherical,  as  it  was  in  the  time  of 
Plutarch.2  We  are  distinctly  told  by  Aristotle  that  various  forms  were  attributed  to  earth  by  early  philoso- 
phers, and  the  implication  is  that  the  spherical  theory,  whose  truth  he  proceeds  to  demonstrate,  was  a new 
thought.3 4 *  It  is  very  unlikely,  except  to  those  who  sincerely  accept  the  theory  of  a primitive  race  of  unequalled 
wisdom,  that  the  sphericity  of  the  earth,  having  been  known  to  Homer,  should  have  been  cast  aside  by  the 
Ionic  philosophers  and  the  Epicureans,  and  forgotten  by  educated  people  five  or  six  centuries  later,  as  it 
must  have  been  before  the  midnight  voyage  of  Helios  in  his  golden  cup,  and  before  similar  attempts  to 
account  for  the  return  of  the  sun  could  have  become  current.  Ignorance  of  the  true  shape  of  the  earth  is  also 
indicated  by  the  common  view  that  the  sun  appeared  much  larger  at  rising  to  the  people  of  India  than  to  the 
Grecians,  and  at  setting  presented  the  same  phenomenon  in  Spain.3  As  we  have  seen,  the  description  of 
Tartarus  in  the  Theogosiy  of  Hesiod,  which  Fick  thinks  an  interpolation  of  much  later  date,  likens  the  earth 
to  a lid. 

The  question  has  always  been  an  open  one.  Crates  of  Mallos,  Strabo,  and  other  Homer-worshippers  of 
antiquity,  could  not  deny  to  the  poet  any  knowledge  current  in  their  day,  but  their  reasons  for  assuming  that 
he  knew  the  earth  to  be  a globe  are  not  strong.  In  recent  years  President  Warren  has  maintained  that 
Homer’s  earth  was  a sphere  with  Oceanus  flowing  around  the  equator,  that  the  pillars  of  Atlas  meant  the  axis 
of  the  earth,  and  that  Ogygia  was  at  the  north  pole.6 *  Homer,  however,  thought  that  Oceanus  flowed  around 
the  known  lands,  not  that  it  merely  grazed  their  southern  border : it  is  met  with  in  the  east  where  the  sun 
rises,  in  the  west  (Od.  iv.  567),  and  in  the  north  (Od.  v.  275). 

That  “ Homer  and  all  the  ancient  poets  conceived  the  earth  to  be  a plane  ” was  distinctly  asserted  by 
Geminus  in  the  first  century  B.  c.,6  and  has  been  in  general  steadfastly  maintained  by  modems  like  Voss/ 
Volcker,8  Buchholtz,9  Gladstone,10  Martin,11  Schaefer,12  and  Gruppe.13  It  is  therefore  intrinsically  probable, 
commonly  accepted,  and  not  contradicted  by  what  is  known  of  the  literature  of  the  time  itself.13 


B.  Homer  s Geography.  — There  is  an  extensive  literature  on  the  geographic  attainments  of  Homer,  but 
it  is  for  the  most  part  rather  sad  reading.  The  later  Greeks  had  a local  identification  for  every  place  men- 


1 See  also  ante,  p.  37. 

2 Plato,  Phaedo , 108  ; Plutarch,  De  facie. 

3 Aristotle,  De  caelo,  ii.  13. 

4 Ctesias,  On  India,  ch.  v.  (ed.  Didot,  p.  80),  says  the 
rising  sun  appears  ten  times  larger  in  India  than  in  Greece. 
Strabo,  Geogr.  iii.  1,  § 5,  quotes  Posidonius  as  denying  a 
similar  story  of  the  setting  sun  as  seen  from  Gades. 

Whether  Herodotus  had  a similar  idea  when  he  wrote 
that  in  India  the  mornings  were  torrid,  the  noons  temperate 
and  the  evenings  cold  (Herod,  iii.  104),  is  uncertain.  Also 
see  Dionysius  Periegetes,  Pcriplus,  1 109-1 1 1 1,  in  Gcographi 
Graeci  minores.  Ed.  C.  Mueller  (Paris,  Didot,  1861),  ii. 
172).  Rawlinson  sees  in  it  only  a statement  of  climatic 
fact. 

6 The  True  Key  to  Ancient  Cosmogonies,  in  the  Year 

Book  of  Boston  University,  1882,  and  separately,  Boston, 

18S2  ; and  in  his  Paradise  Found,  4th  ed.  (Boston,  1885). 

3 Geminus,  Isagoge,  c.  13. 

’ “ Ueber  die  Gestalt  der  Erde  nach  den  Begriffen  der 

Alten,”  in  Kritische  Blatter,  ii.  (1790)  130. 


8 Ueber  Homerische  Geographic  und  IVeltkunde  (Han- 
over, 1830). 

9 Homerische  Rcalien,  I.  1.  Homerische  Cosmographie 
tend  Geographic  (Leipzig,  1871). 

10  Homer  and  the  Homeric  Age  (London,  1858),  ii.  334. 
The  question  of  Aeaea,  “ where  are  the  dancing  places  of  the 
dawn”  (Od.  xii.  5),  almost  induces  Gladstone  to  believe 
that  Homer  thought  the  earth  cylindrical,  but  it  may  be 
doubted  if  the  expression  means  more  than  an  outburst  of 
joy  at  returning  from  the  darkness  beyond  ocean  to  the 
realm  of  light. 

11  “ Memoire  sur  la  cosmographie  Grecque  a l’dpoque 
d'Homere  et  d’Hesiode,”  in  Mem.  de  I Acad,  des  Inscr. 
et  des  Belles  Letires , xxviii.  (1874)  1,  211-235. 

12  Entwicklung  der  Ansichten  des  Alterthums  ueber 
Gestalt  U7td  Grosse  der  Erde.  Leipzig,  1868.  (Gymn.  z. 
Insterburg.) 

13  Die  Kosjnischen  Systeme  der  Griechen  (Berlin,  1851). 

14  See  also  Keppel,  Die  A nsichten  der  alten  Griechen 
und  Rbruer  von  der  Gestalt,  Grosse,  rtnd  JYeltstellung  der 
Erde.  (Schweinfurt,  1884.) 


40 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


tioned  in  the  Odyssey ; but  conservative  scholars  at  present  are  chary  of  such,  while  agreed  in  confining  the 
scene  of  the  wanderings  to  the  western  Mediterranean.  Gladstone,  in  Homer  and  the  Homeric  Age , has 
argued  with  ingenuity  for  the  transfer  of  the  scene  from  the  West  to  the  East,  and  has  constructed  on  this 
basis  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  maps  of  “ the  ancient  world  ” known.  K.  E.  von  Baer  ( Wo  ist  der  Schaa- 
platz  d.  Fahrten  d.  Odysseus  zu  finden  ? agreeing  with  Gladstone,  “ identifies  ” the  Lastrygonian 

harbor  with  Balaklava,  and  discovers  the  very  poplar  grove  of  Persephone.  It  is  a favorite  scheme  with 
others  to  place  the  wanderings  outside  the  columns  of  Hercules,  among  the  Atlantic  isles,1  and  to  include  a 
circumnavigation  of  Africa.  The  better  opinion  seems  to  me  that  which  leaves  the  wanderings  in  the  western 
Mediterranean,  which  was  considered  to  extend  much  farther  north  than  it  actually  does.  The  maps  which 
represent  the  voyage  within  the  actual  coast  lines  of  the  sea,  and  indicate  the  vessel  passing  through  the 
Straits  to  the  ocean,  are  misleading.  There  is  not  enough  given  in  the  poem  to  resolve  the  problem.  The 
courses  are  vague,  the  distances  uncertain  or  conventional,  — often  neither  are  given  ; and  the  matter  is  com- 
plicated by  the  introduction  of  a floating  island,  and  the  mysterious  voyages  from  the  land  of  the  Phaeacians. 

It  is  a pleasant  device  adopted  by  Buchholtz  and  others  to  assume  that  where  the  course  is  not  given,  the 
wind  last  mentioned  must  be  considered  to  still  hold,  and  surely  no  one  will  grudge  the  commentators  this 
amelioration  of  their  lot. 

C.  Supposed  References  to  America.  — It  is  well  known  that  Columbus’s  hopes  were  in  part  based 
on  passages  in  classical  authors.2  Glareanus,  quoting  Virgil  in  1527,  after  Columbus’s  discovery  had 
made  the  question  of  the  ancient  knowledge  prominent,  has  been  considered  the  earliest  to  open  the  discus- 
sion;3 and  after  this  we  find  it  a common  topic  in  the  early  general  writers  on  America,  like  Las  Casas  ( His - 
toria  General),  Ramusio  (introd.  vol.  iii.),  and  Acosta  (book  i.  ch.  11,  etc.) 

In  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries  it  was  not  an  uncommon  subject  of  academic  and  learned  dis- 
cussion.4 It  was  a part  of  the  survey  made  by  many  of  the  writers  who  discussed  the  origin  of  the  American 
tribes,  like  Garcia,5 * *  Lafitau,®  Samuel  Mather/  Robertson,8  not  to  name  others. 

It  was  not  till  Humboldt  compassed  the  subject  in  his  Examen  Critique  de  Vhistoire  de  la  geographie  du 
nouveau  continent  (Paris,  1836),  that  the  field  was  fully  scanned  with  a critical  spirit,  acceptable  to  the 
modern  mind.  He  gives  two  of  the  five  volumes  which  comprise  the  work  to  this  part  of  his  subject,  and 
very  little  has  been  added  by  later  research,  while  his  conclusions  still  remain,  on  the  whole,  those  of  the  most 
careful  of  succeeding  writers.  The  French  original  is  not  equipped  with  guides  to  its  contents,  such  as  a 
student  needs;  but  this  is  partly  supplied  by  the  index  in  the  German  translation.9  The  impediments  which 
the  student  encounters  in  the  Examen  Critique  are  a good  deal  removed  in  a book  which  is  on  the  whole  the 
easiest  guide  to  the  sources  of  the  subject,  — Paul  Gaffarel’s  Etude  sur  les  rapports  de  lAmerique  et  de  % 
lancicn  continent  avant  Christophe  Colomb  (Paris,  1869). 19 

The  literature  of  the  supposed  old-world  communication  with  America  shows  other  phases  of  this  question 
of  ancient  knowledge,  and  may  be  divided,  apart  from  the  Greek  embraced  in  the  previous  survey,  into 
those  of  the  Egyptians,  Phoenicians,  Tyrians,  Carthaginians,  and  Romans. 


1 For  example,  K.  Jarz,  “Wo  sind  die  Homerischen  In- 
seln  Trinakie,  Scherie,  etc.  zu  suchen?”  in  Zeilschr.  fur 
ivissensch.  Geogr.  ii.  10-18,  21. 

2 See  Vol.  II.  p.  26.  His  son  Ferdinand  enlarges  upon 
this.  The  passage  in  Seneca’s  Medea  was  a favorite.  This 
is  often  considered  rather  as  a lucky  prophecy.  Leibnitz, 
Opera  Philologica  (Geneva,  1708),  vi.  317.  Charles  Sum- 
ner’s “ Prophetic  Voices  concerning  America,”  in  Atlantic 
Monthly , Sept.  1867  (also  separately,  Boston,  1874).  Hist. 
Mag.  xiii.  176;  xv.  140. 

3 Vol.  1 1.  25.  Harrisse,  Bib.  A mer.  Vet.  i.  262. 

4 Perizonius,  in  his  note  to  the  story  of  Silenus  and 

Midas,  quoted  from  Theopompus  by  /Llian  in  his  Varia 
Histories  (Rome,  1545;  in  Latin,  Basle,  1548;  in  English, 

1576)1  quotes  the  chief  references  in  ancient  writers.  Cf. 
ASlian,  ed.  by  Perizonius,  Lugd.  Bat.  1701,  p.  217.  Among 
the  writers  of  the  previous  century  quoted  by  this  editor  are 
Rupertus,  Dissertationes  mix  tor  ad  Val.  Max.  (Nurem- 
berg, 1663).  Math.  Berniggerus,  Ex  Taciti  Germanict 
et  Agricola,  questiones  (Argent.  1640).  Eras.  Schmidt, 
Dissert,  de  America , which  is  annexed  to  Schmidt’s  ed. 
of  Pindar  (Witelsbergae,  1616),  where  it  is  spoken  of  as 

“ Discursus  de  insula  Atlantica  ultra  columnas  Herculis 
quae  America  hodie  dicitur.”  Cluverius,  Introduction  in 
univers.  geogr.,  vi.  21,  § 2,  rapports  this  view,  ist  ed., 

1624.  In  the  ed.  1729  is  a note  by  Reiskius  on  the  same 
side,  with  references  (p.  667). 

Of  the  same  century  is  J.  D.  Victor’s  Disputatio  de 
America  (Jenae,  1670). 


In  Brunn’s  Bibliotheca  Danica  are  a number  of  titles 
of  dissertations  bearing  on  the  subject;  they  are  mostly 
old. 

6 Even  the  voyage  of  Kolaos,  mentioned  in  Herodotus 
(iv.  152),  is  supposed  by  Garcia  a voyage  to  America. 

c Moeurs  des  Sauvages  (Paris,  1724). 

7 A ttempt  to  show  that  A merica  must  have  been  known 
to  the  Ancients  (Boston,  1773). 

8 History  of  America,  1775. 

9 See  Vol.  II.  p.  68.  Humboldt  (i.  191)  adopts  the  view 
of  Ortelius  that  the  grand  continent  mentioned  by  Plu- 
tarch is  America  and  not  Atlantis.  Cf.  Brasseur’s  Lettres 
a M.  le  Due  de  Valmy,  p.  57. 

10  Gaffarel  has  since  elaborated  this  part  of  the  book  in 
some  papers,  “ Les  Grecs  et  les  Romains  ont-ils  connu 
l’Amdrique?”  in  the  Revue  de  Geographie  (Oct.  1881,  et 
seq.),  ix.  241,  420;  x.  21,  under  the  heads  of  traditions, 
theories,  and  voyages. 

There  are  references  in  Bancroft’s  Native  Races , v. 
ch.  1;  and  in  his  Cent.  America , vi.  70,  etc.;  in  Short, 
No.  A mer.  of  A ntiq.,  146,  466,  474;  in  DeCosta’s  Pre- 
columbian Discovery . Brasseur  touches  the  subject  in  his 
introduction  to  his  Landaus  Relation  ; Charles  Jourdain,  in 
his  De  l' influence  d’A  ristote  et  de  ses  inter pretes  sur  la 
dlcouverte  du  nouveau  monde  (Paris,  1861),  taken  from 
the  Journal  de  1 Instruction  Publique.  A recent  book, 
W.  S.  Blackett’s  Researches,  etc.  (Lond.  1883),  may  be 
avoided. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


41 


The  Egyptian  theory  has  been  mainly  worked  out  in  the  present  century.  Paul  Felix  Cabrera’s  Teatro  critico 
Americano , printed  with  Rio’s  Palenque  (Lond.,  1822),  formulates  the  proofs.  An  essay  by  A.  Lenoir,  com- 
paring the  Central  American  monuments  with  those  of  Egypt,  is  appended  to  Dupaix’s  Antiquit es  Mexi- 
caines  ( 1805).  Delafield’s  Inquiry  into  the  Origin  of  the  Antiquities  of  America  (Cincinnati,  1839),  traces  it 
to  the  Cushites  of  Egypt,  and  cites  Garcia  y Cubas,  Ezisayo  de  an  Estudio  Comfarativo  entre  las  Piratnides 
Egipcias  y Mexicazias.  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg  discussed  the  question,  SHI  existe  des  sources  de  I’histoire 
primitive  du  Mexique  dans  les  monuments  egyptiens  de  I’histoire  primitive  de  I'ancien  7nonde  dans  les 
monuments  americains?  in  his  ed.  of  Landa’s  Relations  des  Choses  de  Yucatan  (Paris,  1864).  Buckle  (Hist, 
of  Civilization , i.  ch.  2)  believes  the  Mexican  civilization  to  have  been  strictly  analogous  to  that  of  India  and 
Egypt.  Tylor  (Early  Hist,  of  Mankind,  98)  compares  the  Egyptian  hieroglyphics  with  those  of  the  Aztecs. 
John  T.  C.  Heaviside,  Amer.  Antiquities , or  the  New  World  the  Old , and  the  Old  World  the  New  (Lon- 
don, 1868),  maintains  the  reverse  theory  of  the  Egyptians  being  migrated  Americans.  F.  de  Vamhagen 
works  out  his  belief  in  L'origine  touranienne  des  americaizis  tupis-caribes  et  des  anciens  egyptiens  znozitree 
principaleme7it  par  la  philologie  cotnparee  ; et  7iotice  d'u7ie  ezzzigratiozi  ezi  Amerique  effectuee  a tr avers 
V Atlantique plusieurs  silcles  ava7it  7iotre  Ire  (Vienne  1876).1 2 

Aristotle’s  mention  of  an  island  discovered  by  the  Phoenicians  was  thought  by  Gomara  and  Oviedo  to  refer  to 
America.  The  elder  leading  writers  on  the  origin  of  the  Indians,  like  Garcia,  Horn,  De  Laet,  and  at  a later  day 
Lafitau,  discuss  the  Phoenician  theory  ; as  does  Voss  in  his  annotations  on  Pomponius  Mela  (1658),  and  Count 
de  Gebelin  in  his  Monde  primitif  (Paris,  1781).  In  the  present  century  the  question  has  been  touched  by 
Cabrera  in  Rio’s  Paleztque  (1822).  R.  A.  Wilson,  in  his  New  Co7iquest  of  Mexico , assign's  (ch.  v.)  the  ruins 
of  Middle  America  to  the  Phoenicians.  Morlot,  in  the  Actes  de  la  Societe  Jurassie/me  d’ Emulation  (1863), 
printed  his  “ La  decouverte  de  l’Amerique  par  les  Ph&niciens.”  Gaffarel  sums  up  the  evidences  in  a paper  in 
the  Compte  Rc7idu,  Co7ig.  des  Amer.  (Nancy),  i.  93.2 

The  Tyrian  theory  has  been  mainly  sustained  by  a foolish  book,  by  a foolish  man,  A/i  Origitial  History  of 
A71C.  A77icrica  (London,  1843),  by  Geo.  Jones,  later  known  as  the  Count  Johannes  (cf.  Bancroft’s  Native 
Races,  v.  73). 

The  Carthaginian  discovery  rests  mainly  on  the  statements  of  Diodorus  Siculus.3 

Baron  Zach  in  his  Correspo/tde/zz  undertakes  to  say  that  Roman  voyages  to  America  were  common  in  the 
days  of  Seneca,  and  a good  deal  of  wild  speculation  has  been  indulged  in.4 * 

D.  Atlantis.  — The  story  of  Atlantis  rests  solely  upon  the  authority  of  Plato,  who  sketched  it  in  the 
Timaeus,  and  began  an  elaborated  version  in  the  Critias  (if  that  fragment  be  by  him),  which  old  writers  often 
cite  as  the  Atlazzticus.  This  is  frequently  forgotten  by  those  who  try  to  establish  the  truth  of  the  story,  who 
often  write  as  if  all  statements  in  print  were  equally  available  as  “ authorities,”  and  quote  as  corroborations 
of  the  tale  all  mentions  of  it  made  by  classical  writers,  regardless  of  the  fact  that  all  are  later  than  Plato,  and 
can  no  more  than  Ignatius  Donnelly  corroborate  him.  In  fact,  the  ancients  knew  no  better  than  we  what  to 
make  of  the  story,  and  diverse  opinions  prevailed  then  as  now.  Many  of  these  opinions  are  collected  by  Pro- 
clus  in  the  first  book  of  his  commentary  on  the  Tiznaeusp  and  all  shades  of  opinion  are  represented  from 
those  who,  like  Crantor,  accepted  the  story  as  simply  historical,  to  those  who  regarded  it  as  a mere  fable. 
Still  others,  with  Proclus  himself,  accepted  it  as  a record  of  actual  events,  while  accounting  for  its  introduction 
in  Plato  by  a variety  of  subtile  metaphysical  interpretations.  Proclus  reports  that  Crantor,  the  first  commen- 
tator upon  Plato  (circa  B.  c.  300),  asserted  that  the  Egyptian  priests  said  that  the  story  was  written  on  pillars 
which  were  still  preserved,6  and  he  likewise  quotes  from  the  Ethiopic  History  of  Marcellus,  a writer  of  whom 


1 Of  lesser  importance  are  these : Bancroft’s  Native 
Races , iv.  364,  v.  55  ; Short,  418;  Stephens’s  Cent.  Azner., 
ii.  438-442  ; M’Culloh’s  Researches , 171  ; Weise,  Discov- 
eries of  A meric  a,  p.  2 ; Campbell  in  Coz/ipte  Rendu, 
Congrhs  des  A zziir.  1875,  i.  W.  L.  Stone  asks  if  the 
mound-builders  were  Egyptians  (Mag.  A zzter.  History,  ii. 
533)- 

2 Of  less  importance  are : Bancroft,  Nat.  Races,  v.  63- 
77,  with  references ; Short,  145  ; Baldwin’s  A nc.  A z/terica, 

162,  171 ; Warden's  Rcchcrches,  etc.  The  more  general 
discussion  of  Humboldt,  Brasseur  (Nat.  Civ.),  Gaffarel 
(Rapport),  De  Costa,  etc.,  of  course  helps  the  investigator 
to  clues. 

The  subject  is  mixed  up  with  some  absurdity  and  deceit. 
The  Dighton  Rock  has  passed  for  Phoenician  (Stiles’ 
Sermon,  1783;  Yates  and  Moulton’s  Wert)  York).  At  one 
time  a Phoenician  inscription  in  Brazil  was  invented  (Azu. 

Geog.  Soc.  Bull.  1886,  p.  364;  St.  John  V.  Day’s  Pre- 
historic Use  of  Iron,  Lond.  1877,  p.  62).  The  notorious 
"Cardiff  giant,  conveniently  found  in  New  York  state,  was 

presented  to  a credulous  public  as  Phoenician  (A  m. 
Azztiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  Ap.  1875).  The  history  of  this  hoax  is 
given  by  W.  A.  McKinney  in  the  New  Englartder,  1875, 
P-  759- 


3 Cf.  Johr.  Langius,  Medicizialiutn  Epistolarntzz  Miscel- 
lanea (Basle,  1554-60),  with  a chapter,  “De  novis  Americi 
orbis  insulis,  antea  ab  Hannone  Carthaginein  repertis ; ” 
Gebelin’s  Monde  Priznitif ; Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  iii. 
3*3.  v.  77;  Short,  145,  209. 

4 A specimen  is  in  M.  V.  Moore’s  paper  in  the  Mag.  of 
Azner.  Hist.  (1884),  xii.  113,  354.  There  are  various  fugi- 
tive references  to  Roman  coins  found  often  many  feet  under 
ground,  in  different  parts  of  America.  See  for  such,  Or- 
telius,  Theatz-uzzz  orbis  terraruzzi ; Haywood’s  Tezizies - 
see  (1820);  Hist.  Mag.,  v.  314;  Mag.  Azner.  Hist.,  xiii. 
457 ; Marcel  de  Serre,  Coszztogonie  de  Moise,  p.  32  ; and 
for  pretended  Roman  inscriptions,  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg, 
Nat.  Civ.  Mix.,  preface;  Journal  de  P Instructiozi  Pub- 
lique,  Juin,  1853;  Humboldt,  Exazzt.  Crit.,  \.  166;  Gaf- 
farel in  Rev.  de  Glog.,  ix.  427. 

6 Procli  coznzztentarius  in  Platonis  Tiznaeuzzz . Rec. 

C.E.  C.  Schneider.  ( Yratislaz.'iae.  1847.)  The  Coznzzzezt- 
taries  of  Proclus  ozi  the  Tizztacus  of  Plato.  Trazzslated 
by  Thoznas  Taylor,  2 vols.  40.  (London,  1820.)  Proclus 
lived  A.  d.  412-485.  The  passages  of  importance  are  found 
in  the  translation,  vol.  i.  pp.  64,  70,  144,  148. 

6 Taylor,  i.  64. 


42 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


nothing  else  is  known,  a statement  that  according  to  certain  historians  there  were  seven  islands  in  the  external 
sea  sacred  to  Proserpine ; and  also  three  others  of  great  size,  one  sacred  to  Pluto,  one  to  Ammon,  and  another, 
the  middle  one,  a thousand  stadia  in  size,  sacred  to  Neptune.  The  inhabitants  of  it  preserved  the  remem- 
brance, from  their  ancestors,  of  the  Atlantic  island  which  existed  there,  and  was  truly  prodigiously  great, 
which  for  many  periods  had  dominion  over  all  the  islands  in  the  Atlantic  sea,  and  was  itself  sacred  to  Nep- 
tune.1 Testimony  like  this  is  of  little  value  in  such  a case.  What  comes  to  us  at  third  hand  is  more  apt  to 
need  support  than  give  it ; yet  these  two  passages  are  the  strongest  evidence  of  knowledge  of  Atlantis 
outside  of  Plato  that  is  preserved.  We  do  indeed  find  mention  of  it  elsewhere  and  earlier.  Thus  Strabo  2 
says  that  Posidonius  (b.  c.  135-51)  suggested  that,  as  the  land  was  known  to  have  changed  in  elevation, 
Atlantis  might  not  be  a fiction,  but  that  such  an  island-continent  might  actually  have  existed  and  disappeared. 
Pliny  3 also  mentions  Atlantis  in  treating  of  changes  in  the  earth’s  surface,  though  he  qualifies  his  quota- 
tion with  “ si  Platoni  credimus.” 4 A mention  of  the  story  in  a similar  connection  is  made  by  Ammianus 
Marcellinus.5 

In  the  Scholia  to  Plato’s  Republic  it  is  said  that  at  the  great  Panathenaea  there  was  carried  in  procession  a 
peplum  ornamented  with  representations  of  the  contest  between  the  giants  and  the  gods,  while  on  the  peplum 
carried  in  the  little  Panathenaea  could  be  seen  the  war  of  the  Athenians  against  the  Atlantides.  Even 
Humboldt  accepted  this  as  an  independent  testimony  in  favor  of  the  antiquity  of  the  story;  but  Martin  has 
shown  that,  apart  from  the  total  inconsistency  of  the  report  with  the  expressions  of  Plato,  who  places  the  narra- 
tion of  this  forgotten  deed  of  his  countrymen  at  the  celebration  of  the  festival  of  the  little  Panathenaea,  the 
scholiast  has  only  misread  Proclus,  who  states  that  the  peplum  depicted  the  repulse  of  the  barbarians,  i.  e. 
Persians,  by  the  Greeks.6 7 8  To  these  passages  it  is  customary  to  add  references  to  the  Meropian  continent  of 
Theopompus,"  the  Saturnian  of  Plutarch,  the  islands  of  Aristotle,  Diodorus  and  Pausanias,  — which  is  very 
much  as  if  one  should  refer  to  the  New  Atlantis  of  Bacon  as  evidence  for  the  existence  of  More’s  Utopia* 
Plutarch  in  his  life  of  Solon  attributes  Solon’s  having  given  up  the  idea  of  an  epic  upon  Atlantis  to  his  advanced 
age  rather  than  to  want  of  leisure ; but  there  is  nothing  to  show  that  he  had  any  evidence  beyond  Plato  that 
Solon  ever  thought  of  such  a poem,  and  Plato  does  not  say  that  Solon  began  the  poem,  though  Plutarch 
appears  to  have  so  understood  him.9  Thus  it  seems  more  probable  that  all  the  references  to  Atlantis  by 
ancient  writers  are  derived  from  the  story  in  Plato  than  that  they  are  independent  and  corroborative  state- 
ments. 

With  the  decline  of  the  Platonic  school  at  Alexandria  even  the  name  of  Atlantis  readily  vanished  from 
literature.  It  is  mentioned  by  Tertullian,10  and  found  a place  in  the  strange  system  of  Cosmas  Indico-pleustes,11 
but  throughout  the  Middle  Ages  little  or  nothing  was  known  of  it.  That  it  was  not  quite  forgotten  appears 
from  its  mention  in  the  Image  da  Monde , a poem  of  the  thirteenth  century,  still  in  MS.,  where  it  is  assigned 
a location  in  the  Mer  Betce  (=  coagulee).1'2  Plato  was  printed  in  Latin  in  1483,  1484,  1491,  and  in  Greek 
in  1513,  and  in  1534  with  the  commentary  of  Proclus  on  the  Timaeus.13  The  Timaeus  was  printed  sepa- 
rately five  times  in  the  sixteenth  century,  and  also  in  a French  and  an  Italian  translation.14 

The  discovery  of  America  doubtless  added  to  the  interest  with  which  the  story  was  perused,  and  the  old 
controversy  flamed  up  with  new  ardor.  It  was  generally  assumed  that  the  account  given  by  Plato  was  not  his 
invention.  Opinions  were,  however,  divided  as  to  whether  he  had  given  a correct  account.  Of  those  who 
believed  that  he  had  erred  as  to  the  locality  or  as  to  the  destruction  of  the  island,  some  thought  that  America 
was  the  true  Atlantis,  while  others,  with  whose  ideas  we  have  no  concern  here,  placed  Atlantis  in  Africa,  Asia, 
or  Europe,  as  prejudice  led  .them.  Another  class  of  scholars,  sensible  of  the  necessity  of  adhering  to  the  text 
of  the  only  extant  account,  accepted  the  whole  narrative,  and  endeavored  to  find  in  the  geography  of  the 


1 Procl.  in  Tim.  (Schneider),  p.  126;  Taylor,  i.  148. 
Also  in  Fragmenta  Historicorum  Graecorum,  ed.  Mueller. 
(Paris,  1832),  vol.  iv.  p.  443. 

2 Geogr.  ii.  § 3,  § 6 (p.  103). 

3 Hist.  Nat.,  ii.  92. 

4 The  Atlantis  mentioned  by  Pliny  in  Hist.  Nat.,  vi.  36, 
is  apparently  entirely  distinct  from  the  Atlantis  of  Plato. 

0 Amm.  Marc.  xvii.  7,  § 13.  Fiunt  autem  terrarum  mo- 
tus  modis  quattuor,  aut  enim  brasmatiae  sunt,  . . . aut  cli- 
matiae  . . . aut  chasmatiae,  qui  grandiori  motu  patefactis 
subito  voratrinis  terrarum  partes  absorbent,  ut  in  Atlantico 
mare  Europaeo  orbe  spatiosor  insula,  etc.  (Ed.  Eyssen- 
hardt,  Berlin,  1871,  p.  106). 

6 Martin,  Etudes  sur  le  Timie  (1841),  i.  305,  306.  The 
passage  in  question  is  in  Sc  hoi.  ad  Rempubl.,  p.  327,  Plato, 
ed.  Bekker,  vol.  ix.  p.  67. 

7 Cited  in  Aelian’s  Varia  Historia,  iii.  ch.  18.  For  the 
other  references  see  above,  pp.  23,  25,  26. 

8 Ammianus  Marcellinus  (xv.  9)  quotes  from  Timagenes 

(who  wrote  in  the  first  century  a history  of  Gaul,  now  lost) 

a statement  that  some  of  the  Gauls  had  originally  immi- 

grated from  very  distant  islands  and  from  lands  beyond  the 


Rhine  (ab  insulis  extimis  confluxisse  et  tractibus  transrhe- 
nanis)  whence  they  were  driven  by  wars  and  the  incursions 
of  the  sea  (Timag.  in  Mueller,  Frag.  hist,  of  Grace.,  iii. 
323).  It  would  seem  incredible  that  this  should  be  dragged 
into  the  Atlantis  controversy,  but  such  has  been  the  case. 

9 Plutarch,  Solon,  at  end.  R.  Prinz,  De  Solonis  Plu - 
tarchi fontibus  (Bonnje,  1857). 

10  De  Pallio,  2,Apol.,  p.  32.  Also  by  Arnobius,  Adver- 
sus  gentes,  i.  5. 

11  Ed.  Montfaucon,  i.  1 14-125,  ii.  131,  136-138,  iv.  186- 
192,  xii.  340. 

12  Gaffarel  in  Revue  de  Geographic , vi. 

13  Platonis  omnia  opere  cum  comm.  Procliiin  Timaeum, 
etc.  (Basil.  Valderus,  1534). 

14  Ex  Platoni  Timaeo  particula,  Ciceronis  libro  de  uni- 
versitate  respondens.  ...  op.  jo.  Perizonii  (Paris,  Tileta- 
nus,  1540;  Basil,  s.  a.;  Paris,  Morell,  1551).  Interpret. 
Cicerone  et  Chalcidio,  etc.  (Paris,  1579).  Le  Timie  de 
Platon,  translati  du  grec  en  franfais,  par  L.  le  Roy,  etc. 
(Paris,  1551,  1581).  II  dialogo  di  Platone,  intitolato  il  Ti- 
maeo trad,  da  Sb.  Erizzo,  nuov.  mandat o en  luce  d.  Gir. 
Ruscellii  (Venet.  1558). 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


43 


Atlantic,  or  as  indicated  by  the  resemblances  between  the  flora,  fauna,  and  civilization  of  America  and  of  the 
old  world,  additional  reasons  for  believing  that  such  an  island  had  once  existed,  and  had  disappeared  after 
serving  as  a bridge  by  which  communication  between  the  continents  was  for  a time  carried  on.  The  discussion 
was  prolonged  over  centuries,  and  is  not  yet  concluded.  The  wilder  theories  have  been  eliminated  by  time, 
and  the  contest  may  now  be  said  to  be  between  those  who  accept  Plato’s  tale  as  true  and  those  who  regard  it 
as  an  invention.  The  latter  view  is  at  present  in  favor  with  the  most  conservative  and  careful  scholars,  but 
the  other  will  always  find  advocates.  That  Atlantis  was  America  was  maintained  by  Gomara,  Guillaume 
de  Postel,  Horn,  and  others  incidentally,  and  by  Birchrod  in  a special  treatise,1  which  had  some  influence  even 
upon  the  geographer  Cellarius.  In  1669  the  Sansons  published  a map  showing  America  divided  among  the 
descendants  of  Neptune  as  Atlantis  was  divided,  and  even  as  late  as  1762  Vaugondy  reproduced  it.2  In 
his  edition  of  Plato,  Stallbaum  expressed  his  belief  that  the  Egyptians  might  have  had  some  knowledge  of 
America.3  Cluverius  thought  the  story  was  due  to  a knowledge  of  America.4 

Very  lately  Hyde  Clark  has  found  in  the  Atlantis  fable  evidence  of  a knowledge  of  America:  he  does  not 
believe  in  the  connecting  island  Atlantis,  but  he  holds  that  Plato  misinterpreted  some  account  of  America 
which  had  reached  him.3  Except  for  completeness  it  is  scarcely  worth  mentioning  that  Blackett,  whose  work 
can  really  be  characterized  by  no  other  word  than  absurd,  sees  America  in  Atlantis.6 

Here  should  be  mentioned  a work  by  Berlioux,  which  puts  Euhemerus  to  the  blush  in  the  manner  in  which 
history  with  much  detail  is  extorted  from  mythology.'  He  holds  that  Atlantis  was  the  northwestern  coast  of 
Africa;  that  under  Ouranos  and  Atlas,  astronomers  and  kings,  it  was  the  seat  of  a great  empire  which  had 
conquered  portions  of  America  and  kept  a lively  commercial  intercourse  with  that  country. 

Ortelius  in  several  places  speaks  of  the  belief  that  America  was  the  old  Atlantis,  and  also  attributes  that 
belief  to  Mercator.3 

That  Atlantis  might  really  have  existed9  and  disappeared,  leaving  the  Atlantic  islands  as  remnants,  was  too 
evident  to  escape  notice.  Ortelius  suggested  that  the  island  of  Gades  might  be  a fragment  of  Atlantis,10  and 
the  doctrine  was  early  a favorite.  Kircher,  in  his  very  curious  work  on  the  subterranean  world,  devotes 
considerable  space  to  Atlantis,  rejecting  its  connection  with  America,  while  he  maintains  its  former  existence, 
and  holds  that  the  Azores,  Canaries,  and  other  Atlantic  islands  were  formerly  parts  thereof,  and  that  they 
showed  traces  of  volcanic  fires  in  his  day.11 

Las  Casas  in  his  history  of  the  Indies,  devoted  an  entire  chapter  to  Atlantis,  quoting  the  arguments  of 
Proclus,  in  his  commentary  on  Plato,  in  favor  of  the  story,  though  he  is  himself  more  doubtful.  He  also 
cites  confirmative  passages  from  Philo  and  St.  Anselm,  etc.  He  considers  the  question  of  the  Atlantic  isles, 
and  cites  authorities  for  great  and  sudden  changes  in  the  earth’s  surface.12 

The  same  view  was  taken  by  Becman,13  and  Fortia  D’Urban.  Tumefort  included  America  in  the  list  of 
remnants;  and  De  la  Borde  followed  Sanson  in  extending  Atlantis  to  the  farthest  Pacific  islands.14  Bory 
de  St.  Vincent,16  again,  limited  Atlantis  to  the  Atlantic,  and  gave  on  a map  his  ideas  of  its  contour. 

D’Avezac  maintains  this  theory  in  his  lies  africaines  de  I'Occan  Atlantique ,16  p.  5— S.  Carli  devoted  a 
large  part  of  the  second  volume  of  his  Lettere  Amcricanc  to  Atlantis,  controverting  Baily,  who  placed  Atlantis 


J Birchrodii  Schediasma  de  orbe  novo  non  novo  (Alt- 
dorf,  1683). 

2 The  representation  of  Sanson  is  reproduced  on  p.  18. 
The  full  title  of  these  curious  maps  is  given  by  Martin, 
Etudes  sur  le  Timie , i.  270,  notes. 

3 Plato , ed.  Stallbaum  (Gothae,  1838),  vii.  p.  99,  note  E. 
See  also  his  Prolegomena  de  Critia,  in  the  same  volume, 
for  further  discussion  and  references. 

4 Cluverius,  Introduct.,  ed.  1729,  p.  667. 

0 Examination  of  the  legend  of  Atlantis  in  reference 
to  proto-historic  communications  with  America , in  the 
Trans.  Royal  Hist.  Soc.  (Lond.,  1885),  iii.  p.  1-46. 

0 W.  S.  Blackett,  Researches  into  the  lost  histories  of 
A merica  ; or,  the  Zodiac  shown  to  be  an  old  terrestrial 
map  in  which  the  Atlantic  isle  is  delineated,  etc.  (London, 
1883),  p.  31,  32.  The  work  is  not  too  severely  judged  by 
W.  F.  Poole,  in  the  Dial  (Chicago),  Sept.  84,  note.  The 
author’s  reasons  for  believing  that  Atlantis  could  not  have 
sunk  are  interesting  in  a way.  The  Fourth  Rept.  Bur.  of 
Ethnology  (p.  251)  calls  it  “ a curiosity  of  literature.” 

7 E.  F.  Berlioux,  Lcs  A tlantcs  : histoire  de  l' Atlantis, 
et  de  l' Atlas  primitif  (Paris,  1883).  It  originally  made 
part  of  the  first  Annuaire  of  the  Faculty  des  lettres  de 
Lyon  (Paris,  1SS3). 

8 Thesaurus  Geogr.,  1587,  under  Atlantis.  See  also 
under  Gades  and  Gadirus.  On  folio  2 of  his  Theatrum 
trbis  terrarum  he  rejects  the  notion  that  the  ancients 
knew  America,  but  in  the  index,  under  Atlantis,  he  says 
forte  A merica. 


9 Bartolomd  de  las  Casas,  Historia  de  las  Indias.  Ed. 
De  la  Fuensanto  de  Valle  and  J.  S.  Rayon  (Madrid, 
1875),  i.  cap.  viii.  pp.  73-79. 

10  Taylor,  in  the  introduction  to  the  Timaeus,  in  his 
translation  of  Plato,  regards  as  almost  impious  the  doubts 
as.to  the  truth  of  the  narrative.  The  Works  of  Plato,  vol. 
i.  London,  1804. 

11  I'hcs.  Geogr.,  s.  v.  Gadirus. 

12  A ill  a nas  ii  Kircherii  Mundus  subtcrrancus  in  xii. 
libros  digestus  (Amsterd.,  1678),  pp.  80-83.  He  gives  a 
cut  illustrative  of  his  views  on  p.  82. 

13  H istoria  orbis  terrarum  geographica  eicivilis,  cap.  5, 
§ 2,  hist,  insul.  I.  C.  Becmann,  2d  ed.  (Francfort  on  Oder, 
1680).  Title  from  British  Museum,  as  I have  been  unable 
to  see  the  work.  The  Allg.  Deutsche  Biographie  says  the 
first  edition  appeared  in  1680.  Itwasabookof  considerable 
note  in  its  day. 

14  De  la  Borde,  Histoire  abregee  de  la  mer  du  Sud 
(Paris,  1791). 

15  J.  B.  G.  M.  Bory  de  St.  Vincent,  Essais  sur  les  isles 
Fortuities  ct  P antique  Atlantide  (Paris,  an  xi.  or  1803),  ch. 
7.  Si  les  Canaries  et  les  autres  isles  de  l’ocean  Atlantique 
offrent  les  ddbris  d’un  continent,  pp.  427,  etc.  His  map 
is  given  ante,  p.  ig. 

16  This  is  the  second  part  of  his  lies  de  PA friqtte  ( Paris, 
184S ),  belonging  to  the  series  L' Univers.  Histoire  et  de- 
scription de  tons  les  peuples,  etc.  Cf.  also  his  Les  ties fast- 
iastiques  (Paris,  1845). 


44 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


in  Spitzbergen.  Carli  goes  at  considerable  length  into  the  topographical  and  geological  arguments  in  favor  of 
its  existence.1  The  early  naturalists,  when  the  doctrine  of  great  and  sudden  changes  in  the  earth’s  surface 
was  in  favor,  were  inclined  to  look  with  acquiescence  on  this  belief.  Even  Lyell  confessed  a temptation  to 
accept  the  theory  of  an  Atlantis  island  in  the  northern  Atlantic,  though  he  could  not  see  in  the  Atlantic 
islands  trace  of  a mid-Atlantic  bridge.2  About  the  middle  of  this  century  scholars  in  several  departments  of 
learning,  accepting  the  evidences  of  resemblances  between  the  product  of  the  old  and  new  world,  were  induced 
to  turn  gladly  to  such  a connection  as  would  have  been  offered  by  Atlantis ; and  the  results  obtained  at  about 
the  same  time  by  studies  in  the  pre-Columbian  traditions  and  civilization  of  Mexico  were  brought  forward  as 
supporting  the  same  theory.  That  the  Antilles  were  remnants  of  Atlantis;  that  the  Toltecs  were  descendants 
from  the  panic-stricken  fugitives  of  the  great  catastrophe,  whose  terrors  were  recorded  in  their  traditions,  as 
well  as  in  those  of  the  Egyptians,  was  ardently  urged  by  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg.3 

In  1859  Retzius  announced  that  he  found  a close  resemblance  between  the  skulls  of  the  Guanches  of  the 
C-naries  and  the  Guaranas  of  Brazil,  and  recalled  the  Atlantis  story  to  explain  it.4  In  1846  Forbes  declared 
his  belief  in  the  former  existence  of  a bridge  of  islands  in  the  North  Atlantic,  and  in  1856  Heer  attempted  to 
show  the  necessity  of  a similar  connection  from  the  testimony  of  palaeontological  botany. 

In  i860,  Unger  deliberately  advocated  the  Atlantis  hypothesis  to  explain  the  likeness  between  the  fossil 
flora  of  Europe  and  the  living  flora  of  America,  enumerating  over  fifty  similar  species ; and  Kuntze  found  in 
the  case  of  the  tropical  seedless  banana,  occurring  at  once  in  America  before  1492  and  in  Africa,  a strong 
evidence  of  the  truth  of  the  theory.5 6 

A condensed  review  of  the  scientific  side  of  the  question  is  given  by  A.  Boue  in  his  article  Ueber  die  Rolle 
der  Ver'dnderungcn  des  unorganischen  Festen  im  grossen  Massstabe  in  der  Naturfi 

The  deep-sea  soundings  taken  in  the  Atlantic  under  the  auspices  of  the  governments  of  the  United  States, 
England,  and  Germany  resulted  in  discoveries  which  gave  a new  impetus  to  the  Atlantis  theory.  It  was 
shown  that,  starting  from  the  Arctic  plateau,  a ridge  runs  down  the  middle  of  the  Atlantic,  broadening  toward 
the  Azores,  and  contracting  again  as  it  trends  toward  the  northeast  coast  of  South  America.  The  depth  over 
the  ridge  is  less  than  1,000  fathoms,  while  the  valleys  on  either  side  average  3,000;  it  is  known  after  the  U.  S. 
vessel  which  took  the  soundings  as  the  Dolphin  ridge.  A similar  though  more  uniformly  narrow  ridge 
was  found  by  the  “ Challenger  ” expedition  (1873-76),  extending  from  somewhat  north  of  Ascension  Island 
directly  south  between  South  America  and  Africa.  It  is  known  as  the  Challenger  ridge.  There  is,  beside, 
evidence  for  the  existence  of  a ridge  across  the  tropical  Atlantic,  connecting  the  Dolphin  and  Challenger 
ridges.  Madeira,  the  Canaries,  and  the  Cape  Verde  Islands  are  cut  off  from  these  ridges  by  a deep  valley, 
but  are  connected  by  shoals  with  the  continent.  Upon  the  publication  of  the  Challenger  chart  ( Special  Re- 
port, vii.  1876),  those  who  favored  the  theory  of  communication  between  the  continents  were  not  slow  to 
appropriate  its  disclosures  in  their  interests  ( Nature , Dec.  21,  1876,  xv.  158).  In  March,  1877,  W.  Stephen 
Mitchell  delivered  a lecture  at  South  Kensington,  wherein  he  placed  in  juxtaposition  the  theory  of  Unger 
and  the  revelations  of  the  deep-sea  soundings,  when  he  announced,  however,  that  he  did  not  mean  to  assert 
that  these  ridges  had  ever  formed  a connecting  link  above  water  between  the  continents.7  Others  were  less 
cautious,8  but  in  general  this  interpretation  did  not  commend  itself  as  strongly  to  conservative  men  of  science 
as  it  might  have  done  a few  years  before,  because  such  men  were  gradually  coming  to  doubt  the  fact  of 
changes  of  great  moment  in  the  earth’s  surface,  even  those  of  great  duration. 

In  1869,  M.  Paul  Gaffarel  published  his  first  treatise  on  Atlantis,9  advocating  the  truth  of  the  story,  and  in 
1880  he  made  it  the  subject  of  deeper  research,  utilizing  the  facts  which  ocean  exploration  had  placed  at 
command.10  This  is  the  best  work  which  has  appeared  upon  this  side  of  the  question,  and  can  only  be  set  against 


1 G.  R.  Carli,  Delle  Lettere  Americane , ii.  (1780). 
Lettere,  vii.  and  following ; especially  xiii.  and  following. 

2 Lyell,  Elements  0/  Geology  (Lond.,  1841),  p.  141 ; and 
his  Principles  of  Geology , 10th  ed.  Buffon  dated  the 
separation  of  the  new  and  old  world  from  the  catastrophe  of 
Atlantis.  Epoques  de  la  Nat.,  ed.  Flourens,  ix.  570. 

3 Quatres  lettres  sur  la  Mixique  ; Popul  Vuh , p.  xcix, 
and  his  Sources  de  Phistoire  primitive  du  Mexique , sec- 
tion viii.  pp.  xxiv,  xxxiii,  xxxviii  and  ix,  in  his  edition  of 
Diego  da  Landa,  Relation  des  choses  de  Yucatan  ( Paris, 
1864).  H.  H.  Bancroft,  Nat.  Races, m.  112,264,480  ; v. 
127,  develops  BrasseuPs  theory.  In  his  Hist.  Nat.  Civili- 
sies  he  compares  the  condition  of  the  Colhua  kingdom  of 
Xibalba  with  Atlantis,  and  finds  striking  similarities.  Le 
Plongeon  in  his  Sacred  Mysteries  (p.  92)  accepts  Bras- 
seur’s  theory. 

4 A.  Retzius,  Present  state  of  Ethnology  in  relation  to 
the  form  of  the  human  skull  (Smithsonian  Report,  1859), 

p.  266.  The  resemblance  is  not  indorsed  by  M.  Verneau, 
who  has  lately  made  a detailed  study  of  the  aborigines  of 
the  Canaries. 

6  F.  Unger,  Die  versunkene  Insel  Atlantis  (Wien, 

i860).  Translated  in  the  Journal  of  Botany  (London), 


January,  1865.  Asa  Gray  had  already  called  attention  to 
the  remarkable  resemblance  between  the  flora  of  Japan  and 
that  of  eastern  North  America,  but  had  not  found  the 
invention  of  a Pacific  continent  preferable  to  the  hypothe- 
sis of  a progress  of  plants  of  the  temperate  zone  round  by 
Behring’s  Strait  ( Memoirs  of  the  American  Academy  of 
Arts  and  Sciences,  vi.  377).  Unger’s  theory  has  been  also 
more  or  less  urged  in  Heer’s  Flora  Tertiaria  Helveticae 
(1854-58)  and  his  Urmelt  der  Schweitz  (1865),  and  by  Otto 
Ule  in  his  Die  Erde  (1874),  i.  27. 

6 Sitzungsberichte  der  Math.  Phys.  Classed,  k.  Akad.  d. 
Wissensch.  at  Vienna,  lvii.  (1868)  p.  12. 

7 The  “ Lost  Atlantis  ” and  the  “ Challenger  ” sound- 
ings, Nature,  26  April,  1877,  xv.  553,  with  sketch  map. 

8 J.  Starkie  Gardner,  How  were  the  eocenes  of  England 
deposited ? in  Popular  Science  Review  (London),  July, 
1878,  xvii.  282.  Edw.  H.  Thompson,  A tlantis  not  a Myth , 
in  Popular  Science  Monthly , Oct.,  1879,  xv.  759;  reprinted 
in  Journal  of  Science , Lond.,  Nov.  1879. 

9 Etude  sur  les  rapports  de  V Atlantis  et  de  Pancien 
continent  av ant  Colomb  ( Paris,  1869). 

10  Revue  de  Geographic , Mars,  Avril,  1880,  tom.  vi.  et 
vii.  • 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


45 


the  earlier  work  by  Martin.1  The  same  theory  has  been  supported  by  D.  P.  de  Novo  y Colson,  who  went  so 
far  as  to  predict  the  ultimate  recovery  of  some  Atlantean  manuscripts  from  submarine  grottoes  of  some  of  the 
Atlantic  islands, — a hope  which  surpasses  Mr.  Donnelly.2 

Winchell  found  the  theory  too  useful  in  his  scheme  of  ethnology  to  be  rejected,3  but  it  was  reserved  for 
Ignatius  Donnelly  to  undertake  the  arrangement  of  the  deductions  of  modern  science  and  the  data  of  old 
traditions  into  a set  argument  for  the  truth  of  Plato’s  story.  His  book,4  in  many  ways  a rather  clever  state- 
ment of  the  argument,  so  evidently  presented  only  the  evidence  in  favor  of  his  view,  and  that  with  so  little 
critical  estimate  of  authorities  and  weight  of  evidence,  that  it  attracted  only  uncomplimentary  notice  from  the 
scientific  press.5  It  was,  however,  the  first  long  presentation  of  the  case  in  English,  and  as  such  made  an  im- 
pression on  many  laymen.  In  1882  was  also  published  the  second  volume  of  the  Challenger  Narrative , 
containing  a report  by  M.  Renard  on  the  geologic  character  of  the  mid-Atlantic  island  known  as  St.  Paul’s 
rocks.  The  other  Atlantic  islands  are  confessedly  of  volcanic  origin,  and  this,  which  laymen  interpreted  in 
favor  of  the  Atlantis  theory,  militated  with  men  of  science  against  the  view  that  they  were  remnants  of  a 
sunken  continent.  St.  Paul’s,  however,  was,  as  noted  by  Darwin,  of  doubtful  character,  and  Renard  came 
to  the  conclusion  that  it  was  composed  of  crystalline  schists,  and  had  therefore  probably  been  once  overlaid 
by  masses  since  removed.6  This  conclusion,  which  tended  in  favor  of  Atlantis,  was  controverted  by  A.  Geikie  7 
and  by  M.  E.  Wadsworth,3  (the  latter  having  personally  inspected  specimens,)  on  the  ground  that  the  rocks 
were  volcanic  in  origin,  and  that,  had  they  been  schists,  the  inference  of  denudation  would  not  follow.  Dr. 
Guest  declared  that  ethnologists  have  fully  as  good  cause  as  the  botanists  to  regard  Atlantis  as  a fact.9  A.  J. 
Weise  in  treating  of  the  Discoveries  of  America  adopted  the  Atlantis  fable  unhesitatingly,  and  supposes  that 
America  was  known  to  the  Egyptians  through  that  channel.10 

That  the  whole  story  was  invented  by  Plato  as  a literary  ornament  or  allegorical  argument,  or  that  he  thus 
utilized  a story  which  he  had  really  received  from  Egypt,  but  which  was  none  the  less  a myth,  was  maintained 
even  among  the  early  Platonists,  and  was  the  view  of  Longinus.  Even  after  the  discovery  of  America  many 
writers  recognized  the  fabulous  touch  in  it,  as  Acosta,11  who  thought,  “ being  well  considered,  they  are  redicu- 
lous  things,  resembling  rather  to  Ovid's  tales  then  a Historie  of  Philosophic  worthy  of  accompt,”  and  “ cannot 
be  held  for  true  but  among  children  and  old  folkes”  — an  opinion  adopted  by  the  judicious  Cellarius.12 


1 See  p.  46. 

2 Ultima  teoria  sobre  la  Atlantida.  A paper  read  be- 
fore the  Geographical  Society  at  Lisbon.  I have  seen  only 
the  epitome  in  Bolletino  della  Societh  Geografica  I tali- 
ajia , xvi.  (1879),  p.  693.  Apparently  the  paper  was  pub- 
lished in  1881,  in  the  proceedings  of  the  fourth  congress  of 
Americanists  at  Madrid. 

3 Winchell,  Preadaniites,  or  a demonstration  of  the 
existence  of  man  before  Adam , etc.  (Chicago,  1880),  pp. 
378  and  fol. 

4 Ignatius  Donnelly,  Atlantis  : the  Antediluvian  World 
(N.  Y.,  1882). 

c His  work  is  much  more  than  a defence  of  Plato.  He 
attempts  to  show  that  Atlantis  was  the  terrestrial  paradise, 
the  cradle  of  the  world’s  civilization.  I suppose  it  was 
his  book  which  inspired  Mrs.  J.  Gregory  Smith  to  write 
Atla  : a Story  of  the  Lost  Island  (New  York,  1886). 

Donnelly’s  book  was  favorably  reviewed  by  Prof.  Win- 
chell (“  Ancient  Myth  and  Modern  Fact,”  Dial , Chicago, 
April,  1882,  ii.  284),  who  declared  that  there  was  no  longer 
serious  doubt  that  the  story  was  founded  on  fact.  His 
theory  was  enthusiastically  adopted  by  Mrs.  A.  A.  Knight 
in  Educatio7i  (v.  317),  and  somewhat  more  soberly  by  Rev. 
J.  P.  McLean  in  the  Universalist  Quarterly  (Oct.,  1882, 
xxxix.  436,  “ The  Continent  of  Atlantis  ”).  I have  not 
seen  an  article  in  Katisas  Review  by  Mrs.  H.  M.  Holden, 
quoted  in  Poole's  I tide x ( Kan . Rev.,  viii.  435  ; also,  viii. 
236,  640).  It  was  more  carefully  examined  and  its  claims 
rejected  by  a writer  in  the  Journal  of  Science  (London), 
(“  Atlantis  once  more,”  June,  1883;  xx.  319-327).  W.  F. 
Poole  doubts  whether  Mr.  Donnelly  himself  was  quite  seri- 
ous in  his  theorizing  (“  Discoveries  of  America : the  lost 
Atlantis  theory,”  Dial , Sept.,  1884,  v.  97).  Lord  Arundel 
of  Wardour  controverted  Donnelly  in  The  Secret  of  Plato's 
Atlantis  (London,  1885),  and  believes  that  the  Atlantis 
fable  originated  in  vague  reports  of  Hanno’s  voyage  — a 
theory  hardly  less  remarkable  than  the  one  it  aims  to  dis- 
place. Lord  Arundel’s  book  was  reviewed  in  the  Dublin 


Review  (Plato’s  “ Atlantis  ” and  the  “Periplus”of  Han- 
no),  July,  1886,  xcix.  91. 

6 Renard,  M.,  Report  on  the  Petrology  of  St.  Paul's 
Rocks , Challenger  Report , N arrative  (London,  1882),  ii. 
Appendix  B. 

7 A search  for  “ Atlantis ” with  the  microscope , in  Na- 
ture, 9 Nov.,  1882,  xxvii.  25. 

8 The  microscopic  evidence  of  a lost  cotitinent , in 
Science , 29  June,  18S3,  i.  591. 

9 Origines  Celticae  (London,  1883),  i.  119,  etc. 

10  The  discoveries  of  America  to  the  year  1525  (New 
York,  1884),  ch.  1.  Cf.  Poole’s  review  of  this  jejune  work, 
quoted  above,  for  some  healthy  criticism  of  this  kind  of 
writing  {Dial,  v.  97).  Also  a notice  in  the  Nation,  July  31, 
1884. 

The  scientific  theory  of  Atlantis  is,  I believe,  supported 
by  M.  Jean  d’Estienne  in  the  Revue  des  Questiones  Scien - 
tifiqjies , Oct.,  18S5,  and  by  M.  de  Margay,  Histoire  des 
descouvertes  et  conquZtes  de  V Amerique  (Limoges,  1881), 
but  I have  seen  neither.  H.  H.  Howorth,  The  Mammoth 
and  the  Flood  (London,  1887),  is  struggling  to  revive  the 
credit  of  water  as  the  chief  agent  in  the  transformations  of 
the  earth’s  surface,  and  relies  much  upon  the  deluge  myths, 
but  refuses  to  accept  Atlantis.  He  thinks  the  zoologic  evi- 
dence proves  the  existence  in  pleistocene  times  of  an  easy 
and  natural  bridge  between  Europe  and  America,  but  sees 
no  need  of  placing  it  across  the  mid-Atlantic  (p.  262). 

11  The  naturall  and  morall  historie  of  the  East  and 
West  Indies , etc.,  written  in  Spanish  by  Joseph  Acosta, 
a?id  translated  into  English  by  E.  G[rimeston\  (London, 
1604),  p.  72,  73  (lib.  i.  ch.  22). 

12'Notiiiae  orbis  antiquae  (Amsterdam,  1703-6),  2 vols. 
The  first  ed.  was  Cantab.,  1703.  “Atlantica  insula  Plato- 
nis  quae  similior  fabulae  est  quam  chorographiae,”  lib.  i. 
cap.  xi.  p.  32.  In  the  Additamentum  de  tiovo  orbe  an 
cognatus  fuerit  veteribns  (tome  ii.  lib.  iv.  pp.  164-166) 
Cellarius  speaks  more  guardedly,  and  quotes  with  approval 
the  judgment  of  Perizonius,  which  has  been  given  above 
(p.  22). 


46 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Among  more  recent  writers,  D’Anville,  Bartoli,1  Gosselin,2  Ukert,3  approved  this  view. 

Humboldt  threw  the  weight  of  his  great  influence  in  favor  of  the  mythical  interpretation,  though  he  found 
the  germ  of  the  story  in  the  older  geographic  myth  of  the  destruction  of  Lyctonia  in  the  Mediterranean  (Orph. 
Argonaut.,  1274,  etc.)  ; 4 while  Martin,  in  his  work  on  the  Timaeus , with  great  learning  and  good  sense,  reduced 
the  story  to  its  elements,  concluding  that  such  an  island  had  never  existed,  the  tale  was  not  invented  by  Plato, 
but  had  really  descended  to  him  from  Solon,  who  had  heard  it  in  Egypt. 

Prof.  Jowett  regards  the  entire  narrative  as  “ due  to  the  imagination  of  Plato,  who  could  easily  invent  1 Egyp- 
tians or  anything  else,’  and  who  has  used  the  name  of  Solon  . . . and  the  tradition  of  the  Egyptian  priest  to  give 
verisimilitude  to  his  story  ; ” 5 * and^Bunbury  is  of  the  same  opinion,  regarding  the  story  as  “a  mere  fiction,” 
and  “ no  more  intended  to  be  taken  seriously  . . . than  the  tale  of  Er  the  Pamphylian.”  6 Mr.  Archer-Hind,  the 
editor  of  the  only  separate  edition  of  the  Timaeus  which  has  appeared  in  England,  thinks  it  impossible  to 
determine  “ whether  Plato  has  invented  the  story  from  beginning  to  end,  or  whether  it  really  more  or  less 
represents  some  Egyptian  legend  brought  home  by  Solon,”  which  seems  to  be  a fitting  conclusion  to  the 
whole  matter. 

The  literature  of  the  subject  is  widely  scattered,  but  a good  deal  has  been  done  bibliographically  in  some 
works  which  have  been  reserved  for  special  mention  here.  The  earliest  is  the  Dissertation  sur  V Atlantide,  by 
Th.  Henri  Martin,7  wherein,  beside  a carefully  reasoned  examination  of  the  story  itself  and  similar  geographic 
myths,  the  opposing  views  of  previous  writers  are  set  forth  in  the  second  section,  Histoire  des  Systbnes  sur 
V Atlantide,  pp.  258-280.  Gaffarel  has  in  like  manner  given  a resume  of  the  literature,  which  comes  down 
later  than  that  of  Martin,  in  the  two  excellent  treatises  which  he  has  devoted  to  the  subject ; he  is  convinced 
of  the  existence  of  such  an  isiand,  but  his  work  is  marked  by  such  care,  orderliness,  and  fulness  of  citations 
that  it  is  of  the  greatest  value.8  The  references  in  these  treatises  are  made  with  intelligence,  and  are,  in  gen- 
eral, accurate  and  useful.  That  this  is  not  the  case  with  the  work  of  Mr.  Donnelly  deprives  the  volume  of 
much  of  the  value  which  it  might  have  had.9 


E.  Fabulous  Islands  of  the  Atlantic  in  the  Middle  Ages.  — Fabulous  islands  belong  quite  as 
much  to  the  domain  of  folk-lore  as  to  that  of  geography.  The  legends  about  them  form  a part  of  Ihe  great 
mass  of  superstitions  connected  with  the  sea.  What  has  been  written  about  these  island  myths  is  for  the 
most  part  scattered  in  innumerable  collections  of  folk-tales  and  in  out-of-the-way  sources,  and  it  does  not  lie 
within  the  scope  of  the  present  sketch  to  track  in  these  directions  all  that  has  been  said.  It  will  not  be  out  of 
place,  however,  to  refer  to  a few  recent  works  where  much  information  and  many  references  can  be  found. 
One  of  the  fullest  collections,  though  not  over-well  sorted,  is  by  Lieut.  F.  S.  Bassett,10  consisting  of  brief  notes 
made  in  the  course  of  wide  reading,  well  provided  with  references,  which  are,  however,  often  so  abbreviated  as 


1 Essai  sur  V explication  historique  do  mice  par  Platon 
de  sa  Republique  et  de  son  A tlantide  (in  Reflexions  impar- 
tial s sur  le  progres  real  ou  apparent  que  les  sciences  et 
les  arts  ont  faits  dans  le  xviite  sikcle  en  Europe , Paris, 
1780).  The  work  is  useful  because  it  contains  the  Greek 
text  (from  a MS.  in  the  Bibl.  du  Roi.  Cf.  MSS.  de  la 
bibliotheque , v.  261),  the  Latin  translations  of  Ficinus  and 
Serr:-.nus,  several  French  translations,  and  the  Italian  of 
Frizzo  and  of  Bembo. 

2 Recherches  sur  les  iles  de  V ocean  Atlantique , in  the 
Recherches  sur  la  glographie  des  anciens , i.  p.  146 
(Paris,  1797).  Also  in  the  French  translation  of  Strabo  (i. 
p.  268,  note  3).  Gosselin  thought  that  Atlantis  was  noth- 
ing more  than  Fortaventure  or  Lancerote 

3 Geogr.  d.  Griechen  u.  Romer , i.  1,  p.  59;  ii.  1,  p.  192. 
Cf.  Letronne’s  Essai  sur  les  idles  cosmographiques  qui  se 
rettachent  au  nom  d' A lias,  in  the  Bull.  Univ.  des  sciences 
(Ferussac),  March,  1831. 

4 Examen  Crit.,  i.  167-180;  ii.  192. 

5 The  dialogues  0/ Plato,  translated  by  B.  fowett  ( N.  Y., 
1&73),  ii.  p.  587  (Introduction  to  Critias). 

c B unbury,  History  of  ancient  geography,  i.  402. 

7 Etude  sur  le  Timee  de  Platon  (Paris,  1841),  t.  i.  pp. 
257-333* 

8 Paul  Gaffarel,  Etude  sur  les  rapports  de  V Amerique 
et  de  Vancien  continent  avant  Christophe  Colomb  (Paris, 
1869),  ch.  ler;  DA  tlantide,  pp.  3-27.  The  same  author 
has  more  lately  handled  the  subject  more  fully  in  a series 
of  articles:  L1  Atlantide,  in  the  Revue  de  Geographic, 
April-July,  1880;  vi.  241,  331,  421;  vii.  21,  — which  is 
the  most  detailed  account  of  the  whole  matter  yet  brought 
together. 

9 One  of  the  most  recent  resumes  of  the  question  is  that 

by  Salone  in  the  Grande  Encyclopedic  (Paris,  1888,  iv.  p. 


457).  The  Encyclopcedia  Britannica,  by  the  way,  regards 
the  account,  “ if  not  entirely  fictitious,  as  belonging  to  the 
most  nebulous  region  of  history.” 

A few  miscellaneous  references,  of  no  great  significance, 
may  close  this  list:  Anier.  Antiquarian,  Sept.,  1886;  H. 
H.  Bancroft,  Hat.  Races , v.  123;  J.  S.  Clarke’s  Progress 
of  Maritime  Discovery , p.  ii.  Geo.  Catlin’s  Lifted  and 
Subsided  Rocks  of  A merica  (Lond.,  1870)  illustrates  “ The 
Cataclysm  of  the  Antilles.”  Dr.  Chil,  in  the  Nancy  Con- 
gr'es  des  A mericanistes , i.  163.  Foster's  Prehistoric  Races, 
app.  E.  Haven’s  Archeeol.  U.  S.  Irving's  Columbus, 
app.  xxii.  Major’s  Prince  Henry  (1868),  p.  87.  Nadail- 
lac’s  Les  Prem.  Homines , ii.  114,  and  his  Lf Amerique 
prehistorique , 561.  John  B.  Newman’s  Origin  of  the  Red 
Men  (N.  Y.,  1852).  Prescott’s  Mexico,  iii.  356.  C.  S. 
Rafinesque’s  incomplete  A merican  Nations  (Philad.),  and 
his  earlier  introduction  to  Marshall’s  Kentucky,  and  his 
Amer.  Museum  (1832).  Two  articles  by  L.  Burke  in  his 
Ethnological  fournal  (London),  1848:  The  destruction  of 
Atlantis , July;  The  continent  of  America  known  to  the 
ancient  Egyptians  and  other  nations  of  remote  antiquity, 
Aug.  The  former  article  is  only  a reprint  of  Taylor’s 
trans.  of  Plato.  Roisel’s  Etudes  ante-historiques  (Paris, 
1874),  devoted  largely  to  the  religion  of  the  Atlanteans. 
Leon  de  Rosny’s  “ L’Atlantide  historique”  in  the  Mem. 
de  la  Soc.  d' Ethnographic  (Paris,  1875),  xiii.  33,  159,  or 
Revue  Orientate  et  A ntericaine.  Short’s  No.  A mericans 
of  A ntiquity , ch.  1 1.  Daniel  Wilson’s  Lost  A tlantis  (Mon- 
treal, 1886),  in  Proc.  and  Trans.  Roy.  Soc.  of  Canada f 
1886,  iv.  Cf.  also  Poole's  Index , i.  73;  ii.  27;  and  La- 
rousse’s  Grand  Dictionnaire. 

10  Legends  and  Superstitions  of  the  Sea  and  of  Sailors 
in  all  Lands  and  at  all  Times  (Chicago  and  New  York, 
1885). 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


47 


to  inflict  much  trouble  on  those  who  would  consult  them,  — an  all  too  common  fault.  Of  interest  is  a chapter 
on  Les  lies , in  a similar  work  by  M.  Paul  Sebillot.1  An  island  home  has  often  been  assigned  to  the  soul  after 
death,  and  many  legends,  some  mediaeval,  some  of  great  antiquity,  deal  with  such  islands,  or  with  voyages 
to  them.  Some  account  of  these  will  be  found  in  Bassett,  and  particularly  in  an  article  by  E.  Beauvois  in  the 
Revue  de  I'histoire  de  Religion ,2  where  further  references  are  to  be  found.  Wm.  F.  Warren  has  also  collected 
many  references  to  the  literature  of  this  subject  in  the  course  of  his  endeavor  to  show  that  Paradise  was  at  the 
North  Pole.3  The  long  articles  on  Eden  and  Paradise  in  McClintock  and  Strong’s  Biblical  Encyclopedia 
should  also  be  consulted. 

In  what  way  the  fabulous  islands  of  the  Atlantic  originated  is  not  known,  nor  has  the  subject  been  exhaus- 
tively investigated.  The  islands  of  classical  times,  in  part  actual  discoveries,  in  part  bom  of  confused 
reports  of  actual  discoveries,  and  in  part  probably  purely  mythical,  were  very  generally  forgotten  as  ancient 
civilization  declined.4 *  The  other  islands  which  succeeded  them  were  in  part  reminiscences  of  the  islands 
known  to  the  ancients  or  invented  by  them,  and  in  part  products  of  a popular  mythology,  as  old  perhaps  as 
that  of  the  Greeks,  but  until  now  unknown  to  letters.  The  writers  who  have  dealt  with  these  islands  have 
treated  them  generally  from  the  purely  geographic  point  of  view.  The  islands  are  known  principally  from 
maps,  beginning  with  the  fourteenth  century,  and  are  not  often  met  with  in  descriptive  works.  Formaleoni, 
in  his  attempt  to  show  that  the  Venetians  had  discovered  the  West  Indies  prior  to  Columbus,  made  studies 
of  the  older  maps  which  naturally  led  him  to  devote  considerable  attention  to  these  islands.3 

They  are  also  considered  by  Zurla.6  The  first  general  account  of  them  was  given  by  Humboldt  in  the 
Examen  Critique ,7  and  to  what  he  did  little  if  anything  has  since  been  added.  D’Avezac3 9  treated  the  sub- 
ject, giving  a brief  sketch  of  the  islands  known  to  the  Arab  geographers,  — a curious  matter  which  deserves 
more  attention. 

Still  more  recently  Paul  Gaffarel  has  treated  the  matter  briefly,  but  carefully.3  A study  of  old  maps  by  H. 
Wuttke,  in  the  J ahrcsbcricht  dcs  Vereins  fur  Erdkunde  zu  Dresden ,1°  gives  considerable  attention  to  the 
islands  ; and  Theobald  Fischer,  in  his  commentary  on  the  collection  of  maps  reproduced  by  Ongania,  has  briefly 
touched  on  the  subject,14  as  has  Comelio  Desimoni  in  various  papers  in  the  Atti  della  Societh  Liguredi  Storia 
patria,  xiv.,  and  other  years,  in  the  Atti  dell'  Acad,  dei  Nuova  Lincei , in  the  Gionale  ligustico,  etc.  R.  H. 
Major’s  Henry  the  Navigator  should  also  be  consulted.12 


Strictly  speaking,  the  term  mythical  islands  ought  to  include,  if  not  Frisland  and  Drogeo,  at  least  the  land 
of  Bus,  the  island  of  Bimini  with  its  fountain  of  life,  an  echo  of  one  of  the  oldest  of  folk-tales,  the  island  of 
Saxenburg,  and  the  other  non-existent  islands,  shoals,  and  rocks,  with  which  the  imagination  of  sailors  and 
cartographers  have  connected  the  Atlantic  even  into  the  present  century.  In  fact,  the  name  is  by  common 
consent  restricted  to  certain  islands  which  occur  constantly  on  old  charts : the  Island  of  St.  Brandan,  Antiilia 
or  Isle  of  the  Seven  Cities,  Satanaxio,  Danmar,  Brazil,  Mayda,  and  Isla  Verte.  It  is  interesting  to  note  that 
the  Arab  geographers  had  their  fabulous  islands,  too,  though  so  little  is  known  of  them  that  it  is  at  present 
impossible  to  say  what  relation  they  bear  t*  those  mentioned.  They  say  that  Ptolemy  assigned  25,000  islands 
to  the  Atlantic,  but  they  name  and  describe  seventeen  only,  among  which  we  may  mention  the  Eternal  Islands 
(Canaries?  Azores?),13  El-Ghanam  (Madeira?),  Island  of  the  Two  Sorcerers  (Lancerote  ?),  etc.14 


1 Llgcndcs,  croyances  de  la  mer.  2 vols.  (Pans,  1886.) 
See  ch.  9 in  iere  s^rie. 

2 L'Elysle  transatlantique  et  l' Eden  Occidental  (Mai- 
Juin,  Nov. -Dec.,  1883),  vii.  273;  viii.  673. 

3 Paradise  Found:  the  Cradle  of  the  Human  Race  at 
the  North  Pole  ( Boston,  1885),  4th  ed. 

4 Eumenius  (?),  in  the  third  century  a.  d.,  is  doubtful 
about  the  existence  even  of  the  Fortunate  Isles  (i.  e.  the 
Canaries).  Eumenii panegyricus  Constantino  Aug.,  vii., 
in  Valpy’s  Panegyrici  vetcres  (London,  182S),  iii.  p.  1352. 

Baehrens  credits  this  oration  to  an  unknown  author.  Ma- 
mertinus  appears  to  know  them  from  the  poets  only  (Ibid. 
p.  1529). 

6 Saggio  sulla  nautica  antica  dci  Vencziani,  n *p.,  n.  d. 
(Venice,  1783) ; French  translation  (Venice,  1788). 

0 //  mappamondo  di  Fra  Mauro  descritto  ed  illustrato 
(Venice,  1806).  Di  Marco  Polo  e degli  altri  viaggiatori 
veneziatti  . . . con  append,  sopra  le  antiche'mappe  lavorate 
in  Venezia  (Venice,  1818). 

7 ii.  156,  etc. 

8 D’Avezac  : lies  d’A frique  (Paris,  1848)  2e  partie ; 
lies  connues  des  Arabes , pp.  15;  Les  lies  de  Saint-Bran- 
dan , pp.  19  ; Les  ties  nouvellement  trouv&es  du  quinzibme 
sibcle , pp.  24.  The  last  two  pieces  had  been  previously 
published  under  the  title  Les  lies  fantastiqucs  de  POcean 
Accidental  au  moyen  age , in  the  Nouvelles  A finales  des 
Voyages  (Mars,  Avril,  1845),  2d  s^rie,  i.  293  ; ii.  47. 

9 Les  lies  fantastiqucs  de  PA  tlantique  au  moyen  Age. 


Lyon  [1883],  PP-  15 • This  is  apparently  extracted  from  the 
Bidletin  de  la  SocietS  de  Giographie  de  Lyon  for  1883. 

[In  Poole's  Index  is  a reference  to  an  article  on  imaginary 
islands  in  Lofidon  Society , i.  8o,  150.] 

10  “ Zur  Geschichte  der  Erdkunde  in  der  letzten  Halfte 
des  Mittelalters.  Die  Karten  der  seefahrenden  Volker  Siid- 
Europas  bis  zum  ersten  Druck  der  Erdbeschreibung  des 
Ptolemaeus.”  JaJiresbericht , vi.  vii.  (1870).  Accompa- 
nying the  article  are  sketches  of  the  principal  mediaeval 
maps,  which  are  useful  if  access  to  the  more  trustworthy 
reproductions  cannot  be  had. 

11  Samnilung  mittelalterlicher  Welt-  und  Seekarten  ita - 
lienischen  Ursprungs , etc.  (Venice,  1886),  especially  pp. 
14-22,  and  under  the  notices  of  particular  maps  in  the 
second  part. 

12  The  Life  of  Prince  Henry  of  Portugal,  surname  a 
the  Navigator , etc.  London,  186S. 

13  The  position  of  these  islands  and  the  fact  that  the 
Arabs  believed  that  they  were  following  Ptolemy  in  placing 
in  them  the  first  meridian  seems  almost  conclusive  in  favor 
of  the  Canaries;  but  M.  D’Avezac  is  inclined  in  favor  of 
the  Azores,  because  the  Arabs  place  in  the  Eternal  Isles 
certain  pillars  and  statues  warning  against  further  advance 
westward,  which  remind  him  of  the  equestrian  statues  of 
the  Azores,  and  because  Ebn  S&yd  states  that  the  Islands 
of  Happiness  lie  between  the  Eternal  Islands  and  Africa. 

14  D’Avezac,  lies  d' A frique , ii.  15.  Geographic  d'Abid- 
Fada  trad,  par  M.  Reinaud  et  M.  Guiyard  (Paris, 


48 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


There  has  been  some  difference  of  opinion  as  to  which  of  the  Atlantic  islands  answer  to  the  ancient  con- 
ception of  the  Fortunate  Islands.  It  is  probable  that  the  idea  is  at  the  bottom  of  several  of  these,  but  it  may 
be  doubted  whether  the  island  of  St.  Brandan  is  not  entirely  due  to  the  christianizing  of  this  ancient  fable. 

We  proceed  now  to  examine  the  accounts  of  some  of  these  islands. 

St.  Brandan.  — St.  Brandan,  or  Brendan,  who  died  May  16,  577,  was  Abbot  of  Cluainfert,  in  Ireland, 
according  to  the  legend,  where  he  was  visited  by  a friend,  Barontus,  who  told  him  that  far  in  the  ocean 
lay  an  island  which  was  the  land  promised  to  the  saints.  St.  Brandan  set  sail  for  this  island  in  company 
with  75  monks,  and  spent  seven  years  upon  the  ocean,  in  two  voyages  (according  to  the  Irish  text  in  the  MS. 
book  of  Lismore,  which  is  probably  the  most  archaic  form  of  the  legend),  discovering  this  island  and  many 
others  equally  marvellous,  including  one  which  turned  out  to  be  the  back  of  a huge  fish,  upon  which  they  cele- 
brated Easter.  This  story  cannot  be  traced  beyond  the  eleventh  century,  its  oldest  form  being  a Latin 
prose  version  in  a MS.  of  that  century.  It  is  known  also  in  French,  English,  and  German  translations,  both 
prose  and  verse,  and  was  evidently  a great  favorite  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Intimately  connected  with  the  St. 
Brandan  legend  is  that  of  St.  Malo,  or  Maclovius,  Bishop  of  Aleth,  in  Armorica,  a disciple  of  St.  Brandan,  who 
accompanied  his  superior,  and  whose  eulogists,  jealous  of  the  fame  of  the  Irish  saint,  provided  for  the  younger 
a voyage  on  his  own  account,  with  marvels  transcending  those  found  by  Brandan.  His  church-day  is  Novem- 
ber 17th.  The  story  of  St.  Brandan  is  given  by  Humboldt  and  D’Avezac,1  and  by  Gaffarel.2  Further 
accounts  will  be  found  in  the  Acta  Sanctorum  of  the  Bollandists,3  and  in  the  introductions  and  notes  to  the 
numerous  editions  of  the  voyages,  among  which  reference  only  need  be  made  to  the  original  Latin  edited  by 
M.  Jubinal,4  and  to  the  English  version  edited  by  Thomas  Wright  for  the  Percy  Society.3  A Latin  text  of  the 
fourteenth  century  is  now  to  be  found  in  the  Acta  Sanctorum  Hiberniae  ex  codice  Salmanticensi  nunc 
premium  integre  edita  opera  C.  de  Srnedt  et  J.  de  Backer  (Edinb.  etc.,  1888),  4to,  pp.  m-154.  As  is  well 
known,  Philoponus  gives  an  account  of  the  voyages  of  St.  Brandan  with  a curious  map,  in  which  he  places  the 
island  N.  W.  of  Spain  and  N.  E.  of  the  Canaries,  or  Insulae  Fortunatae!1  The  island  of  St.  Brandan  was  at 
first  apparently  imagined  in  the  north,  but  it  afterward  took  a more  southerly  location.  Ilonore  d’Autun 
identifies  it  with  a certain  island  called  Perdita,  once  discovered  and  then  lost  in  the  Atlantic ; we  have  here, 
perhaps,  some  reminiscence  of  the  name  “ Aprositos,"  which  Ptolemy  bestows  on  one  of  the  Fortunatae 
Insulae. In  some  of  the  earlier  maps  there  is  an  inlet  on  the  west  coast  of  Ireland  called  Lacus  Fortunatus , 
which  is  packed  with  islands  which  are  called  Insulae  Fortunatae  or  Beatae,  and  sometimes  given  as  300  or 
368  in  number.8  But  the  Pizigani  map  of  1367  puts  the  Isole  dicte  Fortunate  S.  Brandany  in  the  place  of 
Madeira;  and  Behaim’s  globe,  in  1492,  sets  it  down  in  the  latitude  of  Cape  de  Verde,  — a legend  against  it 
assigning  the  discovery  to  St.  Brandan  in  565. 

It  is  this  island' which  was  long  supposed  to  be  seen  as  a mountainous  land  southeast  of  the  Canaries. 
After  the  discovery  of  the  Azores  expeditions  were  fitted  out  to  search  for  it,  and  were  continued  until  1721, 
which  are  described  by  Viera,  and  have  been  since  retold  by  all  writers  on  the  subject.3  The  island  was  again 
reported  as  seen  in  1759. 

Antillia,  or  Isle  of  Seven  Cities.  — The  largest  of  these  islands,  the  one  most  persistent  in  its  form 
and  location,  is  Antillia,  which  is  depicted  as  a large  rectangular  island,  extending  from  north  to  south,  lying 


1848-83).  2 vols.  The  first  volume  contains  a treatise 

on  Arabian  geographers  and  their  systems.  Geographic 
d'Edrisi  trad.  par  M.  Jaubert  (Paris,  1836-40).  2 vols. 

4to  (Soc.  de  Geogr.  de  Paris,  Recueil  de  Voyages , v.,  vi.) 
Cf.  Cherbonneau  on  the  Arabian  geographers  in  the  Revue 
de  Geographie  (1881). 

1 Humboldt,  Examen  Crit. , ii.  163;  O' Ayezac,  lies 
d'Afrique,  ii.  19;  St.  Malo’s  voyage  by  Beauvois,  Rev. 
H ist.  Relig. , viii.  986. 

2 Les  voyages  de  Saint  Brandan  et  des  P apoe  dans  PA  t- 
lantique  au  moyen-age,  published  by  the  Soc.  de  Gdogr. 
de  Rochefort  (1881).  See  also  his  Rapports  de  PA  merique 
et  de  Pancien  continent  (Paris,  1869),  p.  173-183.  The 
article  Brenden  in  Stephen’s  Diet,  of  National  Biography , 
vol.  vi.  (London,  1886),  should  be  consulted. 

3 16  May;  Mali , tom.  ii.  p.  699. 

4 La  legende  latine  de  S.  Brandaines , avec  une  traduc- 
tion intdite,  etc.  (Paris,  1836).  M.  Jubinal  gives  a full 
account  of  all  manuscripts. 

6  St.  Brandan , a ntediceval  legend  of  the  sea , in  Eng- 
lish prose  and  verse  (London,  1844).  The  student  of  the 
subject  will  find  use  for  Les  voyages  de  Saint  Brandan  a 
la  recherche  du  paradis  terrestre , legend  en  vers  du 
Xlle  Slide , avec  introduction  par  Francisque  Michel 
(Paris,  1878),  and  “ La  legende  Flamande  de  Saint  Bran- 
dan et  du  bibliographie  ” by  Louis  de  Backer  in  Miscella- 
nies bid 'io graph iq lies,  1878,  p.  J91. 


6 Nova  typis  transacta  navigatio.  Novi  or  bis  India 
occidentalism  etc.  (1621),  p.  11. 

7 1 1 onore  d’Autuu,  Imago  Mundi,  lib.  i.  cap.  36.  In 
Maxima  Bibliotheca  Veterum  Pat  rum  ( Lugd. , 1677),  tom. 
xx.  p.  971. 

8 Humboldt  (.Examen  Critique , ii.  172)  quotes  these 
islands  from  Sanuto  Torsello  (1306).  They  appear  on  a 
map  of  about  1350,  preserved  in  St.  Mark’s  Library  a\ 
Venice  (Wuttke,  in  Jahresber.  d.  Vereins  fur  Erdkunde 
zu  Dresden,  xvi.  20),  as  “ I fortutiate  I beate,  368,”  in 
connection  with  La  Montagne  de  St.  Brandan,  west  of 
Ireland.  They  are  also  in  the  Medicean  Atlas  of  1351,  and 
in  Fra  Mauro’s  map  and  many  others. 

9 Noticias  de  la  historia  general  de  las  islas  de  Cana- 
ria, by  D.  Jos.  de  Viera  y Clavijo,  4 vols.  4to  (Madrid, 
1772-83).  Humboldt,  Examen,  ii.  167.  D’Avezac,  lies 
d'Afrique,  ii.  22,  etc.  Les  lies  fortunies  ou  archipel  des 
Canaries  [by  E.  Pdgot-Ogier],  2 vols.  (Paris,  1862),  i. 
ch.  13.  Saint- Borondon  (A prositus),  pp.  186-198.  Tene- 
rife atid  its  six  satellites,  by  O.  M.  Stone,  2 vols. 
(London,  1887),  i.  319.  This  mirage  probably  explains  the 
Perdita  of  H onore  and  the  Aprositos  of  Ptolemy.  Cf.  O. 
Peschel’s  Abhandlungen  zur  Erd-  und  Volkerkunde 
(Leipzig,  1877),  i.  20.  A similar  story  is  connected  with 
Brazil. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


49 


in  the  mid-Atlantic  about  lat.  350  N.  This  island  first  appears  on  the  map  of  1424,  preserved  at  Weimar,  and 
is  found  on  the  principal  maps  of  the  rest  of  the  century,  notably  in  the  Bianco  of  1436.1  On  some  maps  of  the 
sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  appears  a smaller  island  under  the  name  of  Sette  Citade,  or  Sete  Ciuda- 
des,  which  is  properly  another  name  for  Antiilia,  as  Toscanelli  says  in  his  famous  letter,  wherein  he  recommended 
Antiilia  as  likely  to  be  useful  as  a way-station  on  the  India  voyage.  We  owe  to  Behaim  the  preservation  on 
his  globe  of  1492  of  the  legend  of  this  island.  It  was  discovered  and  settled,  according  to  him,  by  refugees 
from  Spain  in  714,  after  the  defeat  of  King  Roderick  by  the  Moors.  The  settlers  were  accompanied  by  an 
archbishop  and  six  bishops,  each  of  whom  built  him  a town.  There  is  a story  that  the  island  was  rediscovered 
by  a Portuguese  sailor  in  1447.2 

In  apparent  connection  with  Antiilia  are  the  smaller  islands  Danmar  or  Tanmar , Reillo  or  Roy  Ho,  anc 
Satanaxio.  The  latter  alone  is  of  special  interest.  Formaleoni  found  near  Antiilia,  on  the  map  of  Bianco  of 
1436,  an  island  with  a name  which  he  read  as  “ Y<J  laman  Satanaxio,”  — a name  which  much  perplexed  him, 
until  he  found,  in  an  old  Italian  romance,  a legend  that  in  a certain  part  of  India  a great  hand  arose  every  day 
from  the  sea  and  carried  off  the  inhabitants  into  the  ocean.  Adapting  this  tale  to  the  west,  he  translated  the 
name  11  Island  of  the  hand  of  Satan,” 3 in  which  interpretation  Humboldt  acquiesced.  D’Avezac,  how- 
ever, was  inclined  to  think  that  there  were  two  islands,  one  called  Delamar,  a name  which  elsewhere  appears 
as  Danmar  or  Tanmar,  and  Satanaxio,  or,  as  it  appears  on  a map  by  Beccario  at  Parma,  S at  an  agio  ± and  sug- 
gests that  the  word  is  a corrupt  form  for  S.  Atanaxio  or  S.  Atanagio,  i.  e.  St.  Athanasius,  with  which  Gaffarel 
is  inclined  to  agree.5 

Formaleoni  saw  in  Antiilia  a foreknowledge  of  the  Antilles,  and  Hassel  believed  that  North  and  South 
America  were  respectively  represented  by  Satanaxio  and  Antiilia,  with  a strait  between,  just  as  the  American 
continent  was  indeed  represented  after  the  discovery.  It  is  certainly  curious  that  Beccario  designates  the 
group  of  Antiilia,  Satanagio,  and  Danmar,  as  Isle  de  novo  repertc , the  name  afterwards  applied  to  the  dis- 
coveries of  Columbus ; but  it  is  not  now  believed  that  the  fifteenth-century  islands  were  aught  but  geo- 
graphical fancies.  To  transfer  their  names  to  the  real  discoveries  was  of  course  easy  and  natural.6 


Brazil.  — Among  the  islands  which  prefigured  the  Azores  on  fourteenth-century  maps  appears  I.  de  Brazi 
on  the  Medicean  portulano  of  1351,  and  it  is  apparently  Terceira  or  San  Miguel.7  On  the  Pizigani  map  of 
1367  appear  three  islands  with  this  name,  Insula  de  Bracir  or  Bracie , two  not  far  from  the  Azores,  and  one 
off  the  south  or  southeast  end  of  Ireland.  On  the  Catalan  map  of  1375  is  an  Insula  de  Brazil  in  the  southern 
part  of  the  so-called  Azores  group,  and  an  Insula  de  Brazil  (?)  applied  to  a group  of  small  islands  enclosed 
in  a heavy  black  ring  west  of  Ireland.  The  same  reduplication  occurs  in  the  Solerio  of  1385,  in  a map  of  1426 


1 M.  Buache  in  his  Mhnoire  stir  lisle  Antiilia  {Mem. 
Itist.  de  France , Sciences  math,  et  phys .,  vi.,  1806),  read 
on  a copy  of  the  Pizigani  map  of  1367,  sent  to  him  from 
Parma,  the  inscription,  Ad  ripas  A ntilliae  or  Antullio. 
Cf.  Buache’s  article  in  German  in  Al/g.  Geogr.  Epheme- 
riden, xxiv.  129.  Humboldt  ( Examen , ii.  177)  quotes  Zurla 
( Viaggi , ii.  324)  as  denying  that  such  an  inscription  can  be 
made  out  on  the  original;  but  Fischer  {Sammlung  vun 
IV elt-karten , p.  19)  thinks  this  form  of  the  name  can  be 
made  out  on  Jomard’s  fac-simile.  Wuttke,  however,  thinl.s 
that  the  word  Antiilia  is  not  to  be  made  out,  and  gives  the 
inscription  as.  Hoc  sont  statua  q fuit  ut  tenprs  A cities , 
and  reads  Hoc  sunt  statuae  quae  fuerunt  ante  a temporibus 
A rcules—Herculis  (Wuttke,  Zur  Geschichte  der  Erdkunde 
in  der  letzten  Haelfte  des  Mittelalters,  p.  26,  in  Jahres - 
bericht  des  Vereins  fur  Erdkunde  zu  Dresden , vi.  and  vii. , 
1870).  The  matter  is  of  interest  in  the  story  of  the  eques- 
trian statue  of  Corvo.  According  to  the  researches  of 
Humboldt,  this  story  first  appears  in  print  in  the  history 
of  Portugal  by  Faria  y Sousa  {Epitome  de  las  historias 
Portuguezas , Madrid,  1628.  Historia  del  Reyno  de  Por- 
tugal, 1730),  who  describes  on  the  “Mountain  of  the 
Crow,”  in  the  Azores,  a statue  of  a man  on  horseback 
pointing  westward.  A later  version  of  the  story  mentions 
a western  promontory  in  Corvo  which  had  the  form  of  a 
person  pointing  westward.  Humboldt  (ii.  231),  in  an  inter- 
esting sketch,  connects  this  story  with  the  Greek  traditions 
of  the  columns  of  Hercules  at  Gades,  and  with  the  old 
opinion  that  beyond  no  one  could  pass ; and  with  the  curi- 
ous Arabic  stories  of  numberless  columns  with  inscriptions 
prohibiting  further  navigation,  set  up  by  Dhoulcarnaiti,  an 
Arabian  hero,  in  whose  personality  Hercules  and  Alexander 
the  Great  are  curiously  compounded  (see  Edrisi).  Hum- 
boldt quotes  from  Buache  a statement  that  on  the  Pizigani 
map  of  1367  there  is  near  Brazil  (Azores)  a representation 
of  a person  holding  an  inscription  and  pointing  westward. 

VOL.  I.  — 4 


2 Feman  Colomb,  Historia , ch.  9;  Horn,  De  Origi - 
nibus  A mer.  p.  7,  quoted  by  Gaffarel  in  his  Les  ties  fan - 
tasiiques , p.  3,  note  1,  2.  D’Avezac,  lies  cT  Afrique,  ii.  27, 
quotes  a similar  passage  from  Medina  {Arte  naviguar ), 
who  found  it  in  the  Ptolemy  dedicated  to  Pope  Urban 
(1378-1389).  According  to  D’Avezac  (lies,  ii.  28),  a 
il  geographical  document  ” of  1455  gives  the  name  as  An - 
till  is,  and  identifies  it  with  Plato’s  A tlantis . 

3 Formaleoni,  Essai,  148. 

4 D’Avezac  marks  as  wrong  the  reading  Sarastagio  of 

Humboldt.  t 

6 D’Avezac,  lies  d'  Afrique,  ii.  29;  Gaffarel,  lies  fan • 
tastiques , 12.  Fischer  ( Sammlung , 26)  translates  Sata- 
naxio, Satanshand,  but  thinks  the  island  of  Deman, 
which  appears  on  the  Catalan  chart  of  1375,  is  meant  by 
the  first  half  of  the  title.  The  Catalan  map,  fac-similed  by 
Buchon  and  Foster  in  the  Notices  et  extraits  des  docu- 
ments, xiv.  2,  lias  been  more  exactly  reproduced  in  the 
Choir  des  documents  glogra ph iques  conservees  h la  Bill. 
Nat.  (Paris,  1883). 

6 Peter  Martyr,  in  1493,  states  that  cosmographers  had 
determined  that  Hispaniola  and  the  adjacent  isles  were 
Atitillae  insulae , meaning  doubtless  the  group  surround- 
ing Antiilia  on  the  old  maps  (Decades,  i.  p.  11,  ed.  1583); 
but  the  name  was  not  popularly  applied  to  the  new  islands 
until  after  Wytfliet  and  Ortelius  had  so  used  it  (Hum- 
boldt, Examen , ii.  195,  etc.).  But  Schoner,  in  the  dedica- 
tory letter  of  his  globe  of  1523,  says  that  the  king  of  Cas- 
tile through  Columbus  has  discovered  A ntiglias H ispaniam 
Cubam  quoque  (Stevens,  Schoner,  London,  1888,  fac-simile 
of  letter).  In  the  same  way  the  name  Seven  Cities  was 
applied  to  the  pueblos  of  New  Mexico  by  their  first  dis- 
coverers, and  Brazil  passed  from  an  island  to  the  continent. 

7 Humboldt  identified  it  with  Terceirayb\iX.  Fischer  ques- 
tions whether  St.  Michael  does  not  agre$  better  with  the 
easterly  position  constantly  assigned  to  Brazil. 


50 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


preserved  at  Regensburg,  in  Bianco’s  map  of  1436,  and  in  that  of  1448  : here  de  Braxil  is  the  easternmost  of 
the  Azores  group  (i.  e.  y de  Colombi,  de  Zorzi , etc.),  while  the  large  round  island  — more  like  a large  ink-blot 
than  anything  else  — west  of  Ireland  is  y de  Brazil  d.  dinar.  1 In  a map  in  St.  Mark’s  Library,  Venice,  dated 
about  1450,  Brazil  appears  in  four  places.  Fra  Mauro  puts  it  west  of  Ireland,1 2 3 4 * *  and  it  so  appears  in  Ptolemy 
of  1519,  and  Ramusio  in  1556;  but  Mercator  and  Ortelius  inscribe  it  northwest  of  the  Azores. 

Humboldt  has  shown  3 that  brazil-wood,  being  imported  into  Europe  from  the  East  Indies  long  before  the 
discovery  of  America,  gave  its  name  to  the  country  in  the  west  where  it  was  found  in  abundance,  and  he 
infers  that  the  designation  of  the  Atlantic  island  was  derived  from  the  same  source.  The  duplication  of  the 
name,  however,  seems  to  point  to  a confusion  of  different  traditions,  and  in  the  Brazil  off  Ireland  we  doubtless 
have  an  attempt  to  establish  the  mythical  island  of  Hy  Brazil , or  O'Brasile , which  plays  a part  as  a vanishing 
island  in  Irish  legends,  although  it  cannot  be  traced  to  its  origin.  In  the  epic  literature  of  Ireland  relating  to 
events  of  the  sixth  and  subsequent  centuries,  and  which  was  probably  written  down  in  the  twelfth,  there  are 
various  stories  of  ocean  voyages,  some  involuntary,  some  voluntary,  and  several,  like  the  voyage  of  the  sons  of 
Ua  Corra  about  540,  of  St.  Brandan  about  560,  and  of  Mailduin  in  the  eighth  century,  taking  place  in  the  Atlan- 
tic, and  resulting  in  the  discovery  of  numerous  fabulous  islands.*  The  name  of  Brazil  does  not  appear  in  these 
early  records,  but  it  seems  to  belong  to  the  same  class  of  legends.5  It  is  first  mentioned,  as  far  as  I know, 
by  William  Betoner,  called  William  of  Worcester,  who  calls  the  island  Brasyle  and  Brasylle , and  says  that 
July  15,  1480,  his  brother-in-law,  John  Jay,  began  a voyage  from  Bristol  in  search  of  the  island,  returning 
Sept.  18  without  having  found  it.6  This  evidently  belongs  to  the  series  of  voyages  made  by  Bristol  men  in 
search  of  this  island,  which  is  mentioned  by  Pedro  d’ Ayala,  the  Spanish  ambassador  to  England,  in  his  famous 
letter  of  July  25,  1498,  where  he  says  that  such  voyages  in  search  of  Brazylle  and  the  seven  cities  had  been 
made  for  seven  years  past,  “ according  to  the  fancies  of  the  Genoese,”  meaning  Sebastian  Cabot.7 * * 

It  would  seem  that  the  search  for  Brazil  was  of  older  date  than  Cabot’s  arrival.  He  probably  gave  an 
additional  impetus  to  the  custom,  adding  to  the  stories  of  the  fairy  isles  the  legends  of  the  Sette  Citade  or 
Antiilia.  Hardiman,8  quoting  from  a MS.  history  of  Ireland,  in  the  library  of  the  Royal  Irish  Academy, 
written  about  1636,  mentions  an  “ iland,  which  lyeth  far  att  sea,  on  the  west  of  Connaught,  and  some  times  is 
perceived  by  the  inhabitants  of  the  Onles  and  Iris  . . . and  from  Saint  Helen  Head.  Like  wise  several  sea- 
men have  discovered  it,  . . . one  of  whom,  named  Captain  Rich,  who  lives  about  Dublin,  of  late  years  had  a 
view  of  the  land,  and  was  so  neere  that  he  discovered  a harbour  . . . but  could  never  make  to  land”  because 
of  “a  mist  which  fell  upon  him.  . . . Allsoe  in  many  old  mappes  . . . you  still  find  it  by  the  name  of  O’Bra- 
sile  under  the  longitude  of  03°,  oo',  and  the  latitude  of  50°  20'.”  9 In  1675  a pretended  account  of  a visit  to 
this  island  was  published  in  London,  which  is  reprinted  by  Hardiman.10 

An  account  of  the  island  as  seen  from  Arran  given  in  O’Flaherty’s  Sketch  of  the  Island  of  Arran ,H  is  quoted 
by  H.  Halliday  Sterling,  Irish  Minstrelsy,  p.  30 7 (London,  1887).  Mr.  Marshall,  in  a note  in  Notes  and 


1 The  Bianco  map  of  1436  has,  on  the  ocean  sheets,  five 
groups  of  small  islands,  from  south  to  north  : (1)  Canaries; 
(2)  Madeira  and  Porto  Santo;  (3 ) Into  and  chapisa ; (4 ) d. 
brasil , di  colonbi , d.  b.  ntusta , d.  sanzorzi  ; (5)  coriios  and 
cor  bo  marinos;  (6)  de  ventura ; (7)  de  brazil.  West  of 
the  third  and  fourth  lies  A ntillia , and  N.  W.  of  the  fifth  a 
corner  of  de  laman  satanaxio , while  west  of  six  and  seven 
are  numerous  small  islands  unnamed.  On  the  ocean  sheet 
of  the  Bianco  of  1448,  we  have  (2)  Madeira  and  Porto 
Santo  ; (3)  licongi  and  coruo  mar  in;  (4)  de  braxil , zorzi , 
etc. ; (5)  cor  Has  and  coruos  marinos ; (6)  y.  d.  mant 
debentum  ; (7)  j d.  brazil  d.  dinar.  There  is  no  Antiilia 
and  no  Satanaxio,  but  west  of  (3)  and  (4)  are  two  other 
groups:  (1)  yd.  diuechi  marini,  y de  falconi ; (2)  y fortu- 
nat  de  s°.  beati.  blandan , dinferno , de  ipauion , beta 
ixola , dexerta.  There  is  not  much  to  be  hoped  from  such 
geography. 

2 Over  against  Africa  he  has  an  I sol  a dei  Dragoni.  On 
me  Pizigani  map  of  1367  tbe  Brazil  which  lies  W.  of  North 
France  is  accompanied  by  a cut  of  two  ships,  a dragon 
eating  a man,  and  a legend  stating  that  one  cannot  sail 
further  on  account  of  monsters.  There  was  a dragon  in 
the  Hesperian  isles,  and  some  have  connected  it  with  the 
famous  dragon-tree  of  the  Canaries. 

3 Examen , ii.  2x6,  etc. 

4 For  an  account  of  the  Irish  MSS.  see  Eugene  O’Cur- 

ry, Lectures  on  the  MS.  material  of  ancient  Irish  his- 

tory (Dublin,  1861),  lect.  ix.  p.  181 ; H.  d’Arbois  de  Ju- 

bainville,  Introduction  a Vitude  de  la  litter ature  Celtique , 

2 vols.(  Paris,  1883),  i.  chap.  8,  p.  349,  etc. ; also  Essa  (Tun 

catalogue  de  la  literature  epique  d'lrlande,  by  the  same 

author  (Paris,  1883).  For  accounts  of  the  voyages  see 
O’Curry,  p.  252,  and  especially  p.  289,  where  a sketch  of 


that  of  the  sons  of  Ua  Corra  is  given.  A list  of  the  voy- 
ages is  given  by  D’Arbois  de  Jubainville  in  his  Essai , under 
Longeas  (involuntary  voyages)  and  Immra.n  (voluntary 
voyages),  with  details  about  MSS.  and  references  to  texts 
and  translations  ( Mailduin , p.  151  ; Ua  Corra , 152). 
See  also  Beauvois,  Eden  occidental , Rev.  de  VHist.  des 
Relifr.t  viii.  706,  717,  for  voyages  of  Mailduin  and  the  sons 
of  Ua  Corra , and  of  other  voyages.  Also  Joyce,  Old  Cel- 
tic romances  (London,  1879).  Is  M.  Beauvois  in  earnest 
when  he  suggests  that  the  talking  birds  discovered  by  Mail- 
duin (and  also  by  St.  Brandan)  were  probably  parrots,  and 
their  island  a part  of  South  America  ? 

5 The  name  is  derived  by  Celtic  scholars  from  breas , 
large,  and  i,  island. 

6 Guliehni  de  IVorcester  Itineraria , ed.  J.  Nasmyth 
(Cantab.,  1778),  p.  223,  267.  I take  the  quotation  from 
Notes  and  Queries , Dec.  15,  1883,  6th  series,  viii.  475. 
The  latter  passage  is  quoted  in  full  in  Bristol,  past  and 
Present,  by  Nicholls  and  Taylor  (London,  1882),  iii.  292. 
Cf.  H.  Harrisse’s  C.  Colomb.,  i.  317. 

7 Cal.  State  Papers,  Spanish , i.  p.  177. 

8 Irish  Minstrelsy,  or  bardic  remains  of  Ireland,  etc. , 

2 vcls.  (I.ondon,  1831),  i.  368. 

9 This  is  very  nearly  its  position  in  the  A rcano  del  Mare 
of  Dudley,  1646  (Europe  28),  where  it  is  called  “ disabi- 
tata  e incerta.” 

10  i.  369.  O-Brazile , or  the  enchanted  island , being  a 
Perfect  relation  of  the  late  discovery  and  wonderful  dis- 
enchantment of  an  island  on  the  North  [sic]  of  Ireland, 
etc.  (London,  1675). 

11  John  T.  O’Flaherty,  Sketch  of  the  History  and  an- 
tiquities of  the  southern  islands  of  Aran,  etc.  (Dublin, 
1884,  in  Roy.  Irish  Acad.  Trans.,  vol.  xiv.) 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


51 


Queries , Sept.  22,  1883  (6th  s.,  viii.  224),  quotes  Guest,  Origines  Celticae  (London,  1883),  i.  126,  and 
R.  O’Flaherty,  Ogygia , sive  rerum  Hibernicarum  chronologiae  (London,  1685  ; also  in  English  transla- 
tion, Dublin,  1793),  as  speaking  of  O’Brazile.  The  latter  work  I have  not  seen.  Mr.  Marshall  also  quotes 
a familiar  allusion  to  it  by  Jeremy  Taylor  ( Dissuasive  from  Popery , 1667).  This  note  was  replied  to  in 
the  same  periodical,  Dec.  15,  1883,  by  Mr.  Kerslake,  “ N.”  and  W.  Fraser.  Fraser’s  interest  had  been 
attracted  by  the  entry  of  the  island  — much  smaller  than  usual  — on  a map  of  the  French  Geographer  Royal, 
Le  Sieur  Tassin,  1634-1652,  and  he  read  a paper  before  the  Geological  Society  of  Ireland,  Jan.  20,  1870,  sug- 
gesting that  Brazil  might  be  the  present  Porcupine  Bank , once  above  water.  On  the  same  map  Rockall  is 
laid  down  as  two  islands,  where  but  a solitary  rock  is  now  known.1  Brasil  appears  on  the  maps  of  the  last 
two  centuries,  with  Mayda  and  Isle  Verte,  and  even  on  the  great  Atlas  by  Jefferys,  1776,  is  inserted,  although 
called  “imaginary  island  of  O’Brasil.”  It  grows  constantly  smaller,  but  within  the  second  half  of  this 
century  has  appeared  on  the  royal  Admiralty  charts  as  Brazil  Rockfi 

It  would  be  too  tedious  to  enumerate  the  numerous  other  imaginary  islands  of  the  Atlantic  to  which  clouds, 
fogs,  and  white  caps  have  from  time  to  time  given  rise.  They  are  marked  on  all  charts  of  the  last  century  in 
profusion;  mention,  however,  may  be  made  of  the  “land  of  Bus ” or  Busse,  which  Frobisher’s  expedition 
coasted  along  in  1576,  and  which  has  been  hunted  for  with  the  lead  even  as  late  as  1821,  though  in  vain. 

F.  Toscanelli’s  Atlantic  Ocean.  — It  has  been  shown  elsewhere  (Vol.  II.  pp.  30,  31,  38,  90, 101,  103) 
that  Columbus  in  the  main  accepted  the  view  of  the  width  of  the  Atlantic,  on  the  farther  side  of  which  Asia 
was  supposed  to  be,  which  Toscanelli  had  calculated  ; and  it  has  not  been  quite  certain  what  actual  measure- 
ment should  be  given  to  this  width,  but  recent  discoveries  tend  to  make  easier  a judgment  in  the  matter. 

When  Humboldt  wrote  the  Examen  Critique , Toscanelli’s  letter  to  Columbus,  of  unknown  date,3  enclosing 
a copy  of  the  one  he  sent  to  Martinez  in  1474,  was  known  only  in  the  Italian  form  in  Ulloa’s  translation  of 
the  Historic  del  S.  D.  Fernando  Colombo  (V enice,  1571),  and  in  the  Spanish  translation  of  Ulloa’s  version 
by  Barcia  in  the  Historiades primitivos de  las  Indias  occidentales  (Madrid,  1749),  i.  5 bis,  which  was  reprinted 
by  Navarrete,  Coleccion  de  los  viages  y descubrimientos , etc.,  ii.  p.  1.  In  the  letter  to  Martinez,  in  this  form,  it 
is  said  that  there  are  in  the  map  which  accompan.ed  it  twenty-six  spaces  between  Lisbon  and  Quisai,  each 
space  containing  250  miles  according  to  the  Ulloa  version,  but  according  to  the  re-translation  of  Barcia  150 
miles.  This,  with  several  other  changes  made  by  Barcia,  were  followed  by  Navarrete  and  accepted  as  correct 
by  Humboldt,  who  severely  censures  Ximenes  for  adopting  the  Italian  rendering  in  his  Gnomone  fiorent. 
But  the  Latin  copy  of  the  letter  in  Columbus’s  handwriting,  discovered  by  Harrisse  and  made  public  (with 
fac-simile)  in  his  D.  Fernando  Colon  (Seville,  1871), 4 sustained  the  correctness  of  Ulloa’s  version,  giving  250 
miliaria  to  the  space.  This  authoritative  rendering  also  showed  that  while  the  translator  had  in  general  fol- 
lowed the  text,  he  had  twice  inserted  a translation  of  miles  into  degrees,  and  once  certainly,  incorrectly,  making 
in  one  place  100  miles  = 35  leagues,  and  in  another,  2,500  miles  =225  leagues.  Probably  this  discrepancy 
led  to  the  omissions  made  by  Barcia  ; he  was  wrong,  however,  in  changing  the  number  250,  supposing  the  150 
not  to  be  a typographical  error,  and  in  omitting  the  phrase,  “ which  space  (from  Lisbon  to  Quinsai)  is  about 
the  third  part  of  the  sphere.”  The  Latin  text  showed,  too,  that  this  whole  passage  about  distances  was  not  in 
the  Martinez  letter  at  all,  but  formed  the  end  of  the  letter  to  Columbus,  since  in  the  Latin  it  follows  the  date 
of  the  Martinez  letter,  into  which  it  has  been  interpolated  by  a later  hand.  Finally  the  publication  of  Las 
Casas’s  Historia  de  las  Indias  (Madrid,  1875)  gave  us  another  Spanish  version,  which  differs  from  Barcia’s 
in  closely  agreeing  with  the  Ulloa  version,  and  which  gives  the  length  of  a space  at  250  miles. 

There  were  then  26  X 250  = 6500  miles  between  Lisbon  and  Quinsai,  and  this  was  about  one  third  of  the  cir- 
cumference of  the  earth  in  this  latitude,  but  it  is  not  clear  whether  Roman  or  Italian  miles  were  meant. 

If  the  MS.  in  the  Biblioteca  Nazionale  at  Florence  [Cod.  Magliabechiano  Classe  xi.  num.  121],  described  by 
G.  Uzielli  in  the  Bollcltino  della  Societh  Geografica  Italiana,  x.  1 (1873),  13-28  (“  Ricerche  intorno  a Paolo  dal 
Pozzo  Toscanelli,  ii.  Della  grandezza  della  terra  seeondo  Paolo  Toscanelli  ”),  actually  represents  the  work  of 
Toscanelli,  it  is  of  great  value  in  settling  this  point.  The  MS.  is  inscribed  “ Discorso  di  M°  Paolo  Puteo  Tos- 
canelli sopra  la  cometa  del  1456.”  In  it  were  found  two  papers:  1.  A plain  projection  in  rectangular  form 
apparently  for  use  in  sketching  a map.  It  is  divided  into  spaces,  each  subdivided  into  five  degrees,  and  num- 
bers 36  spaces  in  length.  It  is  believed  by  Sig.  Uzielli  that  this  is  the  form  used  in  the  map  sent  to  Martinez. 
If  this  be  so,  the  26  spaces  between  Lisbon  and  Quinsai  = 130°.  2.  A list  of  the  latitude  and  longitude  of 
various  localities,  at  the  end  of  which  is  inscribed  this  table  : 

Gradus  continet  .68  miliaria  minus  3“  unius.n 
Miliarum  tria  millia  bracchia. 

Bracchium  duos  palmas. 

Palmus.  12.  uncias.  7.  filos. 

The  Florentine  mile  of  3,000  braccia  da  teria  contains,  according  to  Sig.  Uzielli,  1653. 6m.  (as  against 

1 On  Hy  Brasil , a traditional  island  off  the  west  2 In  an  atlas  issued  1866,  I observe  Mayda  and  Green 
ooast  of  Ireland , plotted  in  a MS.  map  written  by  Le  Rock. 

Sieur  Tassin , etc.,  in  the  Jour?ial  of  the  Royal  Geological  3 Harrisse  would  put  it  in  1482.  See  Vol.  II.  p.  go. 

Society  of  Ireland  (1879-80),  vol.  xv.  pt.  3,  pp.  128-131,  * Also  in  his  Bib.  Amer.  Vet.,  p.  xvi. 

fac-simile  of  map. 


52 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


I48im.  to  the  Roman  mile).  Hence  Toscanelli  estimated  a degree  of  the  meridian  at  111,927m,  or  only  552m. 
more  than  the  mean  adopted  by  Bessel  and  Bayer.  Since,  according-  to  the  letter,  one  space  = 250  miles,  and  by 
the  map  one  space  = 50,  we  have  50  miles  to  a degree,  which  would  point  to  an  estimate  for  a latitude  of  about 
420,  allowing  67  2-3  miles  to  an  equatorial  degree.  Lisbon  was  entered  in  thp  table  of  Alpionso  at  41°  N.  (true 
lat.  38°  41'  N.)  By  this  reckoning  Ouinsai  would  fall  1240  west  of  Lisbon  or  io°  west  of  San  Francisco.  It 
does  not  appear  that  the  Florence  MS.  can  be  traced  directly  to  Toscanelli,  but  the  probability  is  certainly  strong 
that  we  have  here  some  of  the  astronomer’s  working  papers,  and  that  Ximenes  did  not  deserve  the  rebuke 
administered  by  Humboldt  for  allowing  250  miles  to  a space,  and  assuming  that  a space  contained  five  degrees 
Certainly  Humboldt’s  use  of  150  miles  is  unjustifiable,  and  his  calculation  of  52°  as  the  angular  distance 
between  Lisbon  and  Quinsai,  according  to  Toscanelli,  is  very  much  too  small,  whatever  standard  we  take  for  the 
mile.  If  we  follow  Uzielli,  the  result  obtained  by  Ruge  ( Geschichte  des  Zeitalters  der  Entdeckungen,  p.  230), 
104°,  is  also  too  small.1 


GAFFAREL’S  MAP* 


1 The  various  versions  of  the  letter  are  as  follows : Ulloa 
( Historic , 1571,  ch.  8).  Dalla  citta  di  Lisbona  per  dritto 
verso  ponente  sono  in  detta  carta  ventisei  spazi,  ciascun 
de’  quali  contien  dugento,  & cinquanta  miglia,  fino  alia 


. . . citta  di  Quisai,  la  quale  gira  cento  miglia,  che  sono 
trentacinque  leghe.  . . . Questo  spazio  e quasi  la  terza  parte 
della  sfera.  . . . E dalla’  Isola  di  Antilia,  che  voi  chiamate 
di  sette  citti, . . . fino  alia  . . . isola  di  Cipango  sono  dieci 


* From  a map  by  Gaffarel,  “ I.’Oc^an  Atlantique  et  les  restes  de  l’Atlantide,”  in  the  Revue  de  Giografihie,  vi.  p. 
400,  accompanying  a paper  by  Gaffarel  in  the  numbers  for  April-July,  1880,  and  showing  such  rocks  and  islets  as  have 
from  time  to  time  been  reported  as  seen,  or  thought  to  have  been  seen,  and  which  Gaffarel  views  as  vestiges  of  the 
lost  continent 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


53 


G.  Early  Maps  of  the  Atlantic  Ocean.  — By  the  Editor.  — The  cartographical  history  of  the  At- 
lantic Ocean  is,  even  down  to  our  own  day,  an  odd  mixture  of  uncertain  fact  and  positive  fable.  The  island 
of  Bresil  or  Brazil  was  only  left  off  the  British  Admiralty  charts  within  twenty  years  (see  Vol.  II.  p.  36), 
and  editions  of  the  most  popular  atlases,  like  Colton’s,  within  twenty-five  years  have  shown  Jacquet  Island, 
the  Three  Chimneys,  Maida,  and  others  lying  in  the  mid-sea.  It  may  possibly  be  a fair  question  if  some 
of  the  reports  of  islands  and  rocks  made  within  recent  times  may  not  have  had  a foundation  in  tempo- 
rary uprisings  from  the  bed  of  the  sea.1  We  must  in  this  country  depend  for  the  study  of  this  sub- 
ject on  the  great  collections  of  fac-similes  of  early  maps  made  by  Santarem,  Kunstmann,  Jomard,  and  on  the 
Sammlung  which  is  nowin  progress  at  Venice,  under  the  editing  of  Theobald  Fischer,  and  published  by 
Ongania.2 

We  may  place  the  beginning  of  the  Atlantic  cartography  3 in  the  map  of  Marino  Sanuto  in  1306,  who  was 
first  of  the  nautical  map-makers  of  that  century  to  lay  down  the  Canaries  but  Sanuto  was  by  no  means  sure 
of  their  existence,  if  we  may  judge  from  his  omission  of  them  in  his  later  maps.5 


FIFTEENTH  CENTURY* 


spazi,  che  fanno  due  mila  & cinquecento  miglia,  cio&  du- 
gento,  & venticinque  leghe. 

Barcia.  Hallareis  en  un  mapa,  que  ai  desde  Lisboa,  k 
la  famosa  ciudad  de  Quisay,  tomando  el  camino  derecho  & 
Poniente,  26  espacios,  cada  uno  de  150  millas.  Quisai’  tiene 
35  leguas  de  ambitu.  . . . De  la  isla  Antilla  hasta  la  de  Ci- 
pango  se  quentan  diez  espacios,  que  hacen  225  leguas. 

Las  Casas  : Y de  la  ciudad  de  Lisboa,  en  derecho  por  el 
Poniente,  son  en  la  dicha  carta  26  espacios,  y en  cada  uno 
dellos  hay  250  millas  hasta  la  . . . ciudad  de  Quisay,  la 
cual  etiene  al  cerco  100  millas,  que  son  25  leguas,  . . . (este 
espacio  es  cuasi  la  tercera  parte  de  la  sfera)  . . . 6 de  la 
isla  de  Antil,  . . . Hasta  la  . . . isla  de  Cipango  hay  10 
espacios  que  son  2,500  millas,  es  k sabre,  225  leguas. 

Columbus's  copy:  A civitate  vlixiponis  per  occidentem 
indirecto  sunt  .26.  spacia  in  carta  signata  quorum  quodlibet 
habet  miliaria  .250.  usque  ad  nobilisim[am],  et  maxima 
ciuitatem  quinsay.  Circuit  enim  centum  miliaria  . . . hoc 
spatium  est  fere  tercia  pars  tocius  spere.  . . . Sed  ab  insula 
antilia  vobis  nota  ad  insulam  . . . Cippangu  sunt  decern 
spacia. 

1 Cf.  “ Les  ties  Atlantique,”  by  Jacobs-Beeckmans  in 
the  Bull,  de  la  Soc.  glog.  d'A  nvers , i.  266,  with  map. 

a Of  these  collections,  those  of  Kunstmann  and  Jomard 
are  not  uncommon  in  the  larger  American  libraries.  A set 
of  the  Santarem  series  is  very  difficult  to  secure  complete, 


but  since  the  description  of  these  collections  in  Vol.  II. 
was  written,  a set  has  been  secured  for  Harvard  College 
library,  and  I am  not  aware  of  another  set  being  in  this 
country.  The  same  library  has  the  Ongania  series.  The 
maps  in  this  last,  some  of  which  are  useful  in  the  present 
study,  are  the  following : — 

1.  Arabic  marine  map,  xiiith  cent.  (Milan);  2.  Vis- 
conte,  13 1 1 (Florence);  3.  Carignano,  xivth  cent.  (Flor- 
ence); 4.  Visconte,  1318  (Venice):  5.  Anonymous,  1351 
(Florence);  6.  Pizigani,  1373  (Milan);  7.  Anon.,  xivth 
cent.  (Venice);  8.  Giroldi,  1426  (Venice);  9.  Bianco,  143, 
(Venice);  10.  Anon.,  1447  (Venice);  n.  Bianco,  1448 
(Milan);  12.  Not  issued;  13.  Anon.,  Catalan,  xvth  cent. 
(Florence);  14.  Leardo,  1452;  15.  Fra  Mauro,  1457  (Ven- 
ice); 16.  Cantino,  1501-3  (Modena).  This  has  not  been 
issued  in  this  series,  but  Harrisse  published  a fac-simile  in 
colors  in  connection  with  his  Les  Cortc-Rcal , etc.,  Paris, 
1883.  17*  Agnese,  1554  (Venice).  The  names  on  these 

photographs  are  often  illegible;  how  far  the  condition  of 
the  original  is  exactly  reproduced  in  this  respect  it  is  of 
course  impossible  to  say  without  comparison. 

3 The  notions  prevailing  so  far  back  as  the  first  century 
are  seen  in  the  map  of  Pomponius  Mela  in  Vol.  II.  p.  180. 

4 Vol.  II.  p.  36. 

6 Lelewel  (ii.  119)  gives  a long  account  of  Sanuto  and  his 
maps,  and  so  does  Kunstmann  in  the  Mhnoires  (vii.  ch.2, 


* A conventional  map  of  the  older  period,  which  is  given  in  Santarem’s  Atlas  as  a “ Mappemonde  qui  se  trouve  au 
revers  d'une  M^daille  du  Commencement  du  XVe  Steele.” 


Note.  — The  above  maps  are  reduced  a little  from  the  engraving  in  Allgemeine  Geographische  Ephenienden 
(Weimar,  1807),  vol.  xxiv.  p.  248.  The  smaller  is  an  extract  from  that  of  Fr.  Pizigani  (1367),  and  the  larger  that  of 
Andreas  Bianco  (143b).  There  is  another  fac-simile  of  the  later  in  F.  M.  Erizzo’s  Le  Scoperte  Artiche  (Venice,  1855). 


ji.  G.JSphem,.  /So/,  /&.  t/faC 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


55 


There  are  two  maps  of  Hygden  (a.  d.  1350),  but  the  abundance  of  islands  which  they  present  can  hardly 
be  said  to  show  more  than  a theory.1  There  is  more  likelihood  of  well  considered  work  in  the  Portolano 
Laurenziano-Gaddiano  (a.  d.  1351),  preserved  in  the  Biblioteca  Mediceo-Laurenziana  at  Florence,  of  which 
Ongania,  of  Venice,  published  a fac-simile  in  1881.2  There  are  two  maps  of  Francisco  Pizigani,  which  seem 
to  give  the  Canaries,  Madeira,  and  the  Azores  better  than  any  earlier  one.  One  of  these  maps  (1367)  is  in 
the  national  library  at  Parma,  and  the  other  (1373)  is  in  the  Ambrosian  library  at  Milan  (Studi  biog.  e 
bibliog.,  vol.  ii.  pp.  viii,  57,  58).  The  1367  map  is  given  by  Jomard  and  Santarem.  The  most  famous  of  all 
these  early  maps  is  the  Catalan  Mappemonde  of  1375,  preserved  in  the  great  library  at  Paris.  It  gives  the 
Canaries  and  other  islands  further  north,  but  does  not  reach  to  the  Azores.3  These  last  islands  are  included, 
however,  in  another  Catalan  planisphere  of  not  far  from  the  same  era,  which  is  preserved  in  the  national  library 


at  Florence,  and  has  been  reproduced  by  Ongania  (i88i)4  The  student  will  need  to  compare  other  maps  of  the 
fourteenth  century,  which  can  be  found  mentioned  in  the  Studi,  etc.,  with  references  in  the  Kohl  Maps , sect. 
1.  The  phototypic  series  of  Ongania  is  the  most  important  contribution  to  this  study,  though  the  yellow  tints 
of  the  original  too  often  render  the  details  obscurely  3 So  for  the  next  century  there  are  the  same  guides  ; but 
a number  of  conspicuous  charts  may  well  be  mentioned.  Chief  among  them  are  those  of  Andrea  Bianco  con- 
tained in  the  Atlas  (1436),  in  the  Biblioteca  Marciana  at  Venice,  published  by  Ongania  (1871),  who  also  pub- 
lished (1881)  the  Carta  Nautica  of  Bianco,  in  the  Biblioteca  Ambrosiana  in  Milan.6 


1855)  of  the  Royal  Bavarian  Academy,  but  a more  perfect 
inventory  of  his  maps  is  given  in  the  Studi  biog.  e bibliog. 
of  the  Italian  Geographical  Society  ( 1882,  i.  80;  ii.  50).  Cf. 
Peschel,  Gesch.  der  Erdkutide,  Ruge,  ed.  1877,  p.  210. 
Sanuto’s  map  of  1320  was  first  published  in  his  Liber  Secre- 
torum fidelium  crucis  (Frankfort.  1 8 1 1 . Cf.  reproduction 
in  St.  Martin’s  Atlas,  pi.  vi.  no.  3).  Further  references 
are  in  Winsor’s  Kohl  Maps,  no.  12.  It  is  in  part  repro- 
duced by  Santarem. 


1 Cf.  A mer.  Geog.  Soc.  Journal , xii.  177,  and  references 
in  the  Kohl  Maps,  nos.  13  and  14. 

3 Vol.  II.  p.  38. 

3 Cf.  references  in  Vol.  II.  38. 

4 Cf.  Studi,  etc.,  ii.  no.  392. 

6 Cf.  Desimoni’s  Le  carte  nautiche  Ita/iane  del  tnedio 
evo  a proposito  di  un  libro  del  Prop.  Fischer  (Genoa, 
1888). 

0 Cf.  Vol.  II.  38  for  references ; and  Lelewel  and  Santa 
rem’s  Atlases. 


* After  a sketch  in  St.  Martin’s  Atlas,  pi.  vii. 


56  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  1436  map  has  been  reproduced  in  colors  in 


ANDREAS  BENINCASA,  1476* 


Pietro  Amat  de  San  Filippo’s  Planisferio  disegnato 
del  143b  ( Bollettino  Sac.  Geografia , 1879,  P-  560);  and 
a sketch  of  the  Atlantic  part  is  given  in  the  Allgem. 
Geog.  Ephemeriden , xxiv.  no.  248.1 

During  the  next  .wenty  years  or  more,  the  varying 
knowledge  of  the  Atlantic  is  shown  in  a number  of 
maps,  a few  of  which  may  be  named The  Catalan 
map  “ de  Gabrieli  de  Valsequa,  faite  k Mallorcha  en 
1439,”  which  shows  the  Azores,  and  which  Vespucius 
is  said  to  have  owned  (Santarem,  pi.  54).  The  plani- 
sphere “in  lingua  latina  dell’  anno  1447,”  in  the  na- 
tional library  at  Florence  (Ongania,  1881).  The  world 
maps  of  Giovanni  Leardo  (Johannes  Leardus),  1448  and 
1452,  the  former  of  which  is  given  in  Santarem  (pi.  25, 

also  Hist.  Cartog.  iii.  398),  and  the  latter  reproduced 
by  Ongania,  1880.  One  is  in  the  Ambrosian  library, 
and  the  other  in  the  Museo  Civico  at  Vicenza  (cf.  Studi, 
etc.,  ii.  72,  73).  In  the  Biblioteca  Vittorio  Emanuele 
at  Rome  there  is  the  sea  - chart  of  Bartolomaeus  de 
Pareto  of  1455,  on  which  we  find  laid  down  the  Fortu- 
nate Islands,  St.  Brandan's,  Antiilia,  and  Royllo.2  The 
World  of  Fra  Mauro3  has  been  referred  to  elsewhere  in 
the  present  volume. 

We  come  now  to  the  conditions  of  the  Atlantic  car- 
tography immediately  preceding  the  voyage  of  Colum- 
bus. The  most  prominent  specimens  of  this  period 
are  the  various  marine  charts  of  Grogioso  and  Andreas 
Benincasa  from  1461  to  1490.  Some  of  these  are  given 
by  Santarem,  Lelewel,  and  St.  Martin ; but  the  best 
enumeration  of  them  is  given  in  the  Studi  biog.  e 
bibliog.  della  Soc.  Geog.  Ital.  ii.  66,  77-84,  92,  99,  100. 
Of  Toscanelli’s  map  of  1474,  which  influenced  Colum- 
bus, we  have  no  sketch,  though  some  attempts  have 


LAON  GLOBE.f 

1 Cf.  Studi,  etc.,  vol.  ii.  pp.  viii,  67,  72,  with  references.  3 Cf.  account  of  inaugurating  busts  of  Fra  Mauro  and 
5 Cf.  Pietro  Amat  in  the  Mem.  Soc.  Geografica,  Roma,  John  Cabot,  in  Terzo  Congresso  Geografico  internazionale 

1878;  Studi,  etc.,  ii.  75;  W'nsor’s  Bibliog.  Ptolemy,  sub  (held  at  Venice,  Sept.,  1881,  and  published  at  Rome,  1882), 
anno  1478.  i.  p.  33. 

* After  a sketch  in  St.  Martin’s  Atlas,  pi.  vii. 

t From  a “projection  Synoptique  Cordiforme  ” in  the  Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Giog.,  4e  sbrie,  xx.  (i860),  in  connection 
with  a paper  by  D’Avezac  (p.  398).  Cf.  Oscar  Peschel  in  Ausland , May  12,  1861 ; also  in  his  Abhandlungen , i.  226. 


GEOGRAPHICAL  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  ANCIENTS. 


57 


END  OF  FIFTEENTH  CENTURY.  (Santarem’s  Atlas) 


58 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


NOTE. 

The  upper  of  the  annexed  cuts 
is  from  Bordone’s  Isolario,  1547 ; 
the  under  one  is  an  extract  from 
the  “World”  of  Ortelius,  15S7. 


OCEANO  OCCIDENTALS  made  to  reconstruct  it  from  descriptions. 

(Cf.  Vol.  II.  p.  103;  Harrisse’s  Christophe  Co- 
lomb.,  i.  127,  129.)  Brief  mention  may  also  be 
made  of  the  Laon^lobe  of  14S6  (dated  1493),  °f 
which  D’Avezac  gives  a projection  in  the  Bulletin 
de  la  Soc.  de  Geog.  xx.  417;  of  the  Majorcan 
(Catalan)  Carta  nautica  of  about  1487  (cf.  Studi, 
etc.,  ii.  no.  397 ; Bull.  Soc.  Geog.,  i.  295) ; of  the 
chart  in  the  Egerton  MSS.,  Brit.  Mus.,  made  by 
Christofalo  Soligo  about  the  same  time,  and  which 
has  no  dearth  of  islands  (cf.  Studi,  etc.,  i.  89) ; of 
those  of  Nicola  Fiorin,  Canepa,  and  Giacomo 
Bertran  (Studi,  etc.,  ii.  82,  86,  and  no.  398).  The 
globe  of  Behaim  (1492)  gives  the  very  latest  of 
these  ante-Columbian  views  (see  Vol.  II.  105). 

It  took,  after  this,  a long  time  for  the  Atlantic 
to  be  cleared,  even  partially,  of  these  intrusive 
islands,  and  to  bring  the  proper  ones  into  accurate 
relations.  How  the  old  ideas  survived  may  be 
traced  in  the  maps  of  Ruysch,  1508  (Vol.  II.  115) ; 
Coppo,  1528,  with  its  riot  of  islands  (II.  127) ; 
Mercator,  1541  (II.  177);  Bordone,  1547;  Zaltiere, 
1566  (II.  451)  ; Porcacchi,  1572  (II.  453)  ; Ortelius, 
x575>  1587, — not  to  continue  the  series  further. 


_ 0 1 
og  O 

cfltfrcmk 

e 0 0 

0 0 0 

^ 1 fa  Adla  terra 


7> 

HISPA 


fs 


i^fRRA * 


STRETTO  DI  G I B iY?Trra 
OCEANO  OCCIDENTALE 


fmwatt 


CHAPTER  II. 

PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


BY  JUSTIN  WINSOR,  THE  EDITOR. 

IN  the  previous  chapter,  in  attempting  to  trace  the  possible  connection 
of  the  new  world  with  the  old  in  the  dimmest  past,  it  was  hard,  if  not 
.hopeless,  to  find  among  the  entangled  myths  a path  that  we  could  follow 
with  any  confidence  into  the  field  of  demonstrable  history.  It  is  still  a 
doubt  how  far  we  exchange  myths  for  assured  records,  when  we  enter  upon 
the  problems  of  pre-Columbian  explorations,  which  it  is  the  object  of  the 
present  chapter  to  discuss.  We  are  to  deal  with  supposable  colonizations, 
from  which  the  indigenous  population  of  America,  as  the  Spaniards  found 
it,  was  sprung,  wholly  or  in  part ; and  we  are  to  follow  the  venturesome 
habits  of  navigators,  who  sought  experience  and  commerce  in  a strange 
country,  and  only  incidentally  left  possible  traces  of  their  blood  in  the  peo- 
ples they  surprised.  If  Spain,  Italy,  and  England  gained  consequence  by 
the  discoveries  of  Columbus  and  Cabot,  there  were  other  national  prides  to 
be  gratified  by  the  priority  which  the  Basques,  the  Normans,  the  Welsh,  the 
Irish,  and  the  Scandinavians,  to  say  nothing  of  Asiatic  peoples,  claimed  as 
their  share  in  the  gift  of  a new  world  to  the  old.  The  records  which  these 
peoples  present  as  evidences  of  their  right  to  be  considered  the  forerunners 
of  the  Spanish  and  English  expeditions  have  in  every  case  been  questioned 
by  those  who  are  destitute  of  the  sympathetic  credence  of  a common  kin- 
ship. The  claims  which  Columbus  and  Cabot  fastened  upon  Spain  and 
England,  to  the  disadvantage  of  Italy,  who  gave  to  those  rival  countries 
their  maritime  leaders,  were  only  too  readily  rejected  by  Italy  herself,  when 
the  opportunity  was  given  to  her  of  paling  such  borrowed  glories  before 
the  trust  which  she  placed  in  the  stories  of  the  Zeni  brothers. 

There  is  not  a race  of  eastern  Asia  — Siberian,  Tartar,  Chinese,  Japa- 
nese, Malay,  with  the  Polynesians  — which  has  not  been  claimed  as  discov- 
erers, intending  or  accidental,  of  American  shores,  or  as  progenitors,  more 
or  less  perfect  or  remote,  of  American  peoples  ; and  there  is  no  good  reason 
why  any  one  of  them  may  not  have  done  all  that  is  claimed.  The  histor- 
ical evidence,  however,  is  not  such  as  is  based  on  documentary  proofs  of 
' indisputable  character,  and  the  recitals  advanced  are  often  far  from  precise 
enough  to  be  convincing  in  details,  if  tneir  general  authenticity  is  allowed. 


6o 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Nevertheless,  it  is  much  more  than  barely  probable  that  the  ice  of  Behring 
Straits  or  the  line  of  the  Aleutian  Islands  was  the  pathway  of  successive 
immigrations,  on  occasions  perhaps  far  apart,  or  may  be  near  together  ; and 
there  is  hardly  a stronger  demonstration  of  such  a connection  between  the 
two  continents  than  the  physical  resemblances  of  the  peoples  now  living  on 
opposite  sides  of  the  Pacific  Ocean  in  these  upper  latitudes,  with  the  simi- 
larity of  the  flora  which  environs  them  on  either  shore.1  It  is  quite  as  con- 
ceivable that  the  great  northern  current,  setting  east  athwart  the  Pacific, 
should  from  time  to  time  have  carried  along  disabled  vessels,  and  stranded 
them  on  the  shores  of  California  and  farther  north,  leading  to  the  infusion 
of  Asiatic  blood  among  whatever  there  may  have  been  antecedent  or  au- 
tochthonous in  the  coast  peoples.  It  is  certainly  in  this  way  possible  that 
the  Chinese  or  Japanese  may  have  helped  populate  the  western  slopes  of 
the  American  continent.  There  is  no  improbability  even  in  the  Malays  of 
southeastern  Asia  extending  step  by  step  to  the  Polynesian  islands,  and 
among  them  and  beyond  them,  till  the  shores  of  a new  world  finally  received 
the  impress  of  their  footsteps  and  of  their  ethnic  characteristics.  We  may 
very  likely  recognize  not  proofs,  but  indications,  along  the  shores  of  South 
America,  that  its  original  people  constituted  such  a stock,  or  were  increased 
by  it. 


As  respects  the  possible  early  connections  of  America  on  the  side  of 
Europe,  there  is  an  equally  extensive  array  of  claims,  and  they  have  been 
set  forth,  first  and  last,  with  more  persistency  than  effect.2 

Leaving  the  old  world  by  the  northern  passage,  Iceland  lies  at  the  thresh- 
old of  America.  It  is  nearer  to  Greenland  than  to  Norway,  and  Greenland 
is  but  one  of  the  large  islands  into  which  the  arctic  currents  divide  the 
North  American  continent.  Thither,  to  Iceland,  if  we  identify  the  locali- 
ties in  Geoffrey  of  Monmouth,  King  Arthur  sailed  as  early  as  the  begin- 
ning of  the  sixth  century,  and  overcame  whatever  inhabitants  he  may  have 
found  there.  Here  too  an  occasional  wandering  pirate  or  adventurous  Dane 
had  glimpsed  the  coast.3  Thither,  among  others,  came  the  Irish,  and  in  the 
ninth  century  we  find  Irish  monks  and  a small  colony  of  their  countrymen 
in  possession.4  Thither  the  Gulf  Stream  carries  the  southern  driftwood. 


1 Asa  Gray,  in  Darwiniana,  p.  203.  Cf.  his 
Address  before  Amer.  Assoc.  Adv.  Science,  1827. 

2 The  subject  of  these  pre-Columbian  claims 
is  examined  in  almost  all  the  general  works  on 
early  discovery.  Cf.  Robertson’s  America;  J. 
S.  Vater’s  Untersuchungen  iiber  Amerikas  Be- 
v'dlkerung  aus  dem  alten  Continent  (Leipzig, 

1810)  ; Dr.  F.  X.  A.  Deuber’s  Geschichte  der  Schif- 
fahrt  im  Atlantischen  Ozean  (Bamberg,  1814); 

Ruge,  Geschichte  des  Zeitalters  der  Entdeckungen 
(ch.  2) ; Major’s  Select  L tters  of  Columbus,  in- 
trod.  ; C.  A.  A.  Zestermann’s  Memoir  on  the  Col- 
onization of  America  in  antehistoric  times,  with 
critical  observations  by  E.  G.  Squier  (London, 
1851);  Nouvelles  Annales  des  Voyages  (ii.  404)  ; 


“Les  precurseurs  de  Colomb”  in  Etudes  par  les 
Plres  de  la  Compagnie  de  Jesus  (Leipzig,  1876)  ; 
Oscar  Dunn  in  Revue  Canadienne,  xii.  57,  194, 
305,  871,  909,  — not  to  name  numerous  other  pe- 
riodical papers.  Paul  Gaffarel,  in  his  “ Les  rela- 
tions entre  l’ancien  monde  et  l’Amerique  etaient- 
elles  possibles  au  moyen  age  ? ” (Soc.  Normande 
de  Geog.  Bulletin,  1 88 1,  p.  209),  thinks  that  amid 
the  confused  traditions  there  is  enough  to  con- 
vince us  that  we  have  no  right  to  determine  that 
communication  was  impossible. 

3 MSS.  de  la  bibliothlque  royale  (Paris,  1787), 
i.  462. 

4 De  Costa  in  Journal  Amer.  Geog.  Soc.  xii. 
( 1880)  p.  1 59,  etc.,  with  references. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


6 1 


suggesting  sunnier  lands  to  whatever  race  had  been  allurea  or  driven  to  its 
shelter.1  Here  Columbus,  when,  as  he  tells  us,2  he  visited  the  island  in 
1477,  found  no  ice.  So  that,  if  we  may  place  reliance  on  the  appreciable 
change  of  climate  by  the  precession  of  the  equinoxes,  a thousand  years  ago 
and  more,  when  the  Norwegians  crossed  from  Scandinavia  and  found  these 
Christian  Irish  there,3  the  island  was  not  the  forbidding  spot  that  it  seems 
with  the  lapse  of  centuries  to  be  becoming. 

It  was  in  A.  d.  875  that  Ingolf,  a jarl  4 of  Norway,  came  to  Iceland  with 
Norse  settlers.  They  built  their  habitation  at  first  where  a pleasant  head- 
land seemed  attractive,  the  present  Ingolfshofdi,  and  later  founded  Reik- 
javik,  where  the  signs  had  directed  them  ; for  certain  carved  posts,  which 
they  had  thrown  overboard  as  they  approached  the  island,  were  found  to 
have  drifted  to  that  spot.  The  Christian  Irish  preferred  to  leave  their 
asylum  rather  than  consort  with  the  new-comers,  and  so  the  island  was 
left  to  be  occupied  by  successive  immigrations  of  the  Norse,  which  their 
king  could  not  prevent.  In  the  end,  and  within  half  a century,  a hardy 
little  republic  — as  for  a while  it  was — of  near  seventy  thousand  inhab- 
itants was  established  almost  under  the  arctic  circle.  The  very  next  year 
(a.  d.  876)  after  Ingolf  had  come  to  Iceland,  a sea-rover,  Gunnbiorn, 
driven  in  his  ship  westerly,  sighted  a strange  land,  and  the  report  that  he 
made  was  not  forgotten.5  Fifty  years  later,  more  or  less,  for  we  must  treat 
the  dates  of  the  Icelandic  sagas  with  some  reservation,  we  learn  that  a 
wind-tossed  vessel  was  thrown  upon  a coast  far  away,  which  was  called  Ire- 
land the  Great.  Then  again  we  read  of  a young  Norwegian,  Eric  the  Red, 
not  apparently  averse  to  a brawl,  who  killed  his  man  in  Norway  and  fled  to 
Iceland,  where  he  kept  his  dubious  character ; and  again  outraging  the 
laws,  he  was  sent  into  temporary  banishment,  — this  time  in  a ship  which 
he  fitted  out  for  discovery  ; and  so  he  sailed  away  in  the  direction  of  Gunn- 
biorn’s  land,  and  found  it.  He  whiled  away  three  years  on  its  coast,  and  as 
soon  as  he  was  allowed  ventured  back  with  the  tidings,  while,  to  propitiate 
intending  settlers,  he  said  he  had  been  to  Greenland,  and  so  the  land  got  a 
sunny  name.  The  next  year,  which  seems  to  have  been  a.  d.  985,  he 
started  on  his  return  with  thirty-five  ships,  but  only  fourteen  of  them 


1 Humboldt,  Views  of  Nature,  p.124.  He  also 
notes  the  drifting  of  Eskimo  boats  to  Europe. 

2 Tratado  de  las  cinco  zonas  habitables. 

8 Respecting  these  Christian  Irish  see  the  sup- 
plemental chapters  of  Mallet’s  Northern  Anti- 
quities (London,  1847)  > Dasent’s  Burnt  Njal,  i. 
p.  vii.  ; Moore’s  History  of  Ireland ; Forster’s 
Northern  Voyages  ; W orsaae’s  Danes  and  Nor- 
wegians in  England,  332.  Cf.  on  the  contact  of 
the  two  races  H.  H.  Howorth  on  “ The  Irish 
monks  and  the  Norsemen  ” in  the  Roy.  Hist. 
Soc.  Trans,  viii.  281. 

4 Conybeare  remarks  that  jarl,  naturalized  in 

England  as  earl,  has  been  displaced  in  its  na- 
tive north  by  graf. 


6 It  has  sometimes  been  contended  that  a 
bull  of  Gregory  IV,  in  a.  d.  770,  referred  to 
Greenland,  but  Spitzbergen  was  more  likely  in- 
tended, though  its  known  discovery  is  much 
later.  A bull  of  A.  D.  835,  in  Pontanus’s  Re- 
rum Daniarum  Historia,  is  also  held  to  indicate 
that  there  were  earlier  peoples  in  Greenland 
than  those  from  Iceland.  Sabin  (vi.  no.  22,854) 
gives  as  published  at  Godthaab,  1859-61,  in  3 
vols.,  the  Eskimo  text  of  Greenland  Folk  Lore, 
collected  and  edited  by  natives  of  Greenland, 
with  a Danish  translation,  and  showing,  as  the 
notice  says,  the  traditions  of  the  first  descent  of 
the  Northmen  in  the  eighth  century. 


62 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


reached  the  land.  Wherever  there  was  a habitable  fiord,  a settlement  grew 
up,  and  the  stream  of  immigrants  was  for  a while  constant  and  considerable. 
Just  at  the  end  of  the  century  (a.  d.  999),  Leif,  a son  of  Eric,  sailed  back  to 
Norway,  and  found  the  country  in  the  early  fervor  of  a new  religion  ; for 
King  Olaf  Tryggvesson  had  embraced  Christianity,  and  was  imposing  it  on 
his  people.  Leif  accepted  the  new  faith,  and  a priest  was  assigned  to  him 
to  take  back  to  Greenland  ; and  thus  Christianity  was  introduced  into  arctic 


NORSE  SHIP* 


* This  cut  is  copied  from  one  in  Nordenskiold’s  Voyage  of  the  Vega  (London,  1881),  vol.  i.  p.  50,  where  it 
is  given  as  representing  the  vessel  found  at  Sai.defjord  in  1880.  It  is  drawn  from  the  restoration  given  in  The 
Viking  ship  discovered  at  Gokstad  in  Norway  (Langskibet  fra  Gokstad  ved  Sandefjord)  described  by  N. 
Nicholaysen  (Christiania,  1882).  The  original  vessel  owed  its  preservation  to  being  used  as  a receptacle  for 
the  body  of  a Viking  chief,  when  he  was  buried  under  a mound.  When  exhumed,  its  form,  with  the  sepulchral 
chamber  midships,  could  be  made  out,  excepting  that  the  prow  and  stern  in  their  extremities  had  to  be  restored. 
In  the  ship  and  about  it  were  found,  beside  some  of  the  bones  of  a man,  various  appurtenances  of  the  vessel, 
and  the  remains  of  horses  buried  with  him.  They  are  all  described  in  the  book  above  cited,  from  which  the 
other  cuts  herewith  given  of  the  plan  of  the  vessel  and  one  of  its  rowlocks  are  taken.  The  Popular  Science 
Monthly,  May,  1881,  borrowing  from  La  Nature,  gives  a view  of  the  ship  as  when  found  in  situ.  There  are 
other  accounts  in  The  Antiquary,  Aug.,  1880;  Dec.,  1881  ; 1882,  p.  87;  Scribner's  Magazitie,  Nov.,  1887,  by 
John  S.  White ; Potter's  American  Monthly , Mar.,  1882.  Cf.  the  illustrated  paper,  “ Les  navires  des  peuples 
du  nord,”  by  Otto  Jorell,  in  Congris  Internat.  des  Sciences  geographiques  (Paris,  1875  > PUE  1878),  i.  318. 

Of  an  earlier  discovery  in  1872  there  is  an  account  in  The  ancient  vessel  found  in  the  parish  of  Tune, 
Norway  (Christiania,  1872).  This  is  a translation  by  Mr.  Gerhard  Gade  of  a Report  in  the  Proceedings  of  the 
Society  for  preserving  Norwegian  Antiquities.  (Cf.  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  xiii.  p.  10.)  This  vessel  was 
also  buried  under  a mound,  and  she  was  43J  feet  long  and  four  feet  deep. 

There  is  in  the  Nicholaysen  volume  a detailed  account  of  the  naval  architecture  of  the  Viking  period,  and 
other  references  may  be  made  to  Otto  Jorell’s  Les  navires  des  peuples  du  Nord,  in  the  Congris  internat.  des 
sciences  geog.,  compte  rendu,  187s  (1878,  i.  318)  ; Menioires  de  la  Soc.  royal  des  Antiquaires  du  Nord  (1887, 
p.  280);  Preble,  in  United  Service  (May,  1883,  p.  463),  and  in  his  Amer.  Flag,  p.  159;  De  Costa’s  Pre-Co- 
lumbian Discovery  of  America,  p.  xxxvii ; Fox’s  Landfall  of  Columbus,  p.  3;  Pop.  Science  Monthly,  xix. 
80;  Van  Nostrand's  Eclectic  Engineering  Mag.,  xxiii.  320;  Good  Words,  xxii.  759;  Higginson’s  Larger 
History  U.  S.  for  cuts;  and  J.  J.  A.  Worsaae’s  Prehistory  of  the  North  (Eng.  transl.,  London,  1886)  for  the 
burial  in  ships. 

There  is  a paper  on  the  daring  of  the  Norsemen  as  navigators  by  G.  Brynjalfson  ( Compte  Rendu,  Congris 
des  Americanistes,  Copenhagen,  p.  140),  entitled  “Jusqu’oil  les  anciens  Scandinaves  ont-ils  penetre  vers  le 
pole  arctique  dans  leurs  expeditions  la  mer  glaciale  ? ” 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


63 


America.  So  they  began  to  build  churches  1 in  Greenland,  the  considerable 
ruins  of  one  of  which  stand  to  this  day.2  The  winning  of  Iceland  to  the 
Church  was  accomplished  at  the  same  time. 

There  were  two  centres  of  settlement  on  the  Greenland  coast,  not  where 
they  were  long  suspected  to  be,  on  the  coast  opposite  Iceland,  nor  as  sup- 
posed after  the  explorations  of  Baffin’s  Bay,  on  both  the  east  and  west  side 
of  the  country ; but  the  settlers  seem  to  have  reached  and  doubled  Cape 
Farewell,  and  so  formed  what  was  called  their  eastern  settlement  (Eystri- 
bygd),  near  the  cape,  while  farther  to  the  north  they  formed  their  western 
colony  (Westribygd).3  Their  relative  positions  are  still  involved  in  doubt 


PLAN  OF  VIKING  SHIP. 


In  the  next  year  after  the  second  voyage  of  Eric  the  Red,  one  of  the 
ships  which  were  sailing  from  Iceland  to  the  new  settlement,  was  driven 
far  off  her  course,  according  to  the  sagas,  and  Bjarni  Herjulfson,  who  com- 
manded the  vessel,  reported  that  he  had  come  upon  a land,  away  to  the 
southwest,  where  the  coast  country  was  level ; and  he  added  that  when  he 
turned  north  it  took  him  nine  days  to  reach  Greenland.4  Fourteen  years 
later  than  this  voyage  of  Bjarni,  which  is  said  to  have  been  in  A.  d.  986,  — 
that  is,  in  the  year  1000  or  thereabouts,  — Leif,  the  same  who  had  brought 
the  Christian  priest  to  Greenland,  taking 
with  him  thirty-five  companions,  sailed 
from  Greenland  in  quest  of  the  land  seen 
by  Bjarni,  which  Leif  first  found,  where 
a barren  shore  stretched  back  to  ice- 
covered  mountains,  and  because  of  the 
stones  there  he  called  the  region  Hellu 
land.  Proceeding  farther  south,  he  found 
a sandy  shore,  with  a level  forest-country 

back  of  it,  and  because  of  the  woods  it 

, . ROWLOCK  OF  THE  VIKING  SHIP, 

was  named  Markland.  Two  days  later 

they  came  upon  other  land,  and  tasting  the  dew  upon  the  grass  they  found 


1 Known  as  the  Katortuk  church. 

2 An  apocryphal  story  goes  that  one  of  these 
churches  was  built  near  a boiling  spring,  the  water 
from  which  was  conducted  through  the  building 
in  pipes  for  heating  it  1 The  Zeno  narrative  is  the 
authority  for  this.  Cf.  Gay’s  Pop.  Hist.  U.  S.  i.  79. 

3 The  Westribygd,  or  western  colony,  had  in 

the  fourteenth  century  90  settlements  and  4 


churches;  the  Eystribygd  had  190  settlements,  a 
cathedral  and  eleven  churches,  with  two  large 
towns  and  three  or  four  monasteries. 

4  R.  G.  Haliburton,  in  the  Popular  Science 
Monthly,  May,  1885,  p.  40,  gives  a map  in  which 
Bjarni’s  course  is  marked  as  entering  the  St. 
Lawrence  Gulf  by  the  south,  and  emerging  by 
the  Straits  of  Belle  Isle. 


64 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


it  sweet.  Farther  south  and  westerly  they  went,  and  going  up  a river  came 
into  an  expanse  of  water,  where  on  the  shores  they  built  huts  to  lodge  in 


NORSE  BOAT  USED  AS  A HABITATION* 


for  the  winter,  and  sent  out  exploring  parties.  In  one  of  these,  Tyrker,  a 
native  of  a part  of  Europe  where  grapes  grew,  found  vines  hung  with  their 
fruit,  which  induced  Leif  to  call  the  country  Vinland. 


* From  Viellet-le-Duc’s  Habitation  humaine  (Paris,  1875). 

t From  Worsaae’s  Danes  and  Norwegians  in  England , etc.  “ With  the  exception  of  very  imperfect  rep- 
resentation carved  on  rocks  and  runic  stones  [see  Higginson’s  Larger  History , p.  27],  there  are  no  images 
left  in  the  countries  of  Scandinavia  of  ships  of  the  olden  times  ; but  the  tapestry  tt  Bayeux,  in  Normandy,  is 
a contemporary  evidence  of  the  appearance  of  the  Normanic  ships.” 

t This  group  from  Worsaae’s  Danes  and  Norwegians  in  England , etc.,  p.  64,  shows  the  transition  from 
the  raven  to  the  cross. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


65 


Attempts  have  been  made  to  identify  these  various  regions  by  the  inexact 
accounts  of  the  direction  of  their  sailing,  by  the  very  general  descriptions 
of  the  country,  by  the  number  of  days  occupied  in  going  from  one  point  to 
another,  with  the  uncertainty  if  the  ship  sailed  at  night,  and  by  the  length 
of  the  shortest  day  in  Vinland,  — the  last  a statement  that  might  help  us, 
if  it  could  be  interpreted  with  a reasonable  concurrence  of  opinion,  and  if  it 
were  not  confused  with  other  inexplicable  statements.  The  next  year  Leif’s 
brother,  Thorvald,  went  to  Vinland  with  a single  ship,  and  passed  three  win- 
ters there,  making  explorations  meanwhile,  south  and  north.  Thorfinn  Karl- 
sefne,  arriving  in  Greenland  in  A.  d.  1006,  married  a courageous  widow 
named  Gudrid,  who  induced  him  to  sail  &ith  his  ships  to  Vinland  and  make 
there  a permanent  settlement,  taking  with  him  livestock  and  other  neces- 
saries for  colonization.  Their  first  winter  in  the  place  was  a severe  one  ; but 


Gudrid  gave  birth  to  a son,  Snorre,  from  whom  it  is  claimed  Thorwaldsen, 
the  Danish  sculptor,  was  descended.  The  next  season  they  removed  to  the 
spot  where  Leif  had  wintered,  and  called  the  bay  Hop.  Having  spent  a 
third  winter  in  the  country,  Karlsefne,  with  a part  of  the  colony,  returned 
to  Greenland. 

The  saga  then  goes  on  to  say  that  trading  voyages  to  the  settlement 
which  had  been  formed  by  Karlsefne  now  became  frequent,  and  that  the 
chief  lading  of  the  return  voyages  was  timber,  which  was  much  needed  in 
Greenland.  A bishop  of  Greenland,  Eric  Upsi,  is  also  said  to  have  gone  to 
Vinland  in  a.  d.  1121.  In  1347  the  last  ship  of  which  we  have  any  record 
in  these  sagas  went  to  Vinland  after  timber.  After  this  all  is  oblivion. 

There  are  in  all  these  narratives  many  details  beyond  this  outline,  and 
those  who  have  sought  to  identify  localities  have  made  the  most  they  could 
of  the  mention  of  a rock  here  or  a bluff  there,  of  an  island  where  they 
killed  a bear,  of  others  where  they  found  eggs,  of  a headland  where  they 
buried  a leader  who  had  been  killed,  of  a cape  shaped  like  a keel,  of  broad- 

* Fac-simile  of  Norse  weapons  from  the  Historia  of  Olaus  Magnus  (b.  1490;  d.  1568),  Rome,  1555,  P-  222. 

VOL.  I.  — 5 


66 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


faced  natives  who  offered  furs  for  red  cloths,  of  beaches  where  they  hauled 
up  their  ships,  and  of  tides  that  were  strong ; but  the  more  these  details 
are  scanned  in  the  different  sagas  the  more  they  confuse  the  investigator, 
and  the  more  successive  relators  try  to  enlighten  us  the  more  our  doubts 
are  strengthened,  till  we  end  with  the  conviction  that  all  attempts  at  con- 
sistent unravelment  leave  nothing  but  a vague  sense  of  something  some- 
where done. 

Everywhere  else  where  the  Northmen  went  they  left  proofs  of  their  occu- 


full-size  facsimile  of  thf  TABLE*!,  engraved  by  Prof.  Magnus 
Petersen,  ivith  the  Runes  as  he  sees  them. 


\ 


(TRANSLITERATION  of  the  leaden  tablet.) 

-p  (at)  I>(e)r  kuen(e)  sine  prinsined  (b)  a d (m)oto  las- 

ANA  KRISTI  DONAVIST1  GARDIAR  IARD1AR 
1BODIAR  KRISTUS  UINKIT  KRISTUS  REG- 
MAT  KRISTUS  IMPERAT  KRISTDS  AB  OMNI 
MALO  ME  ASAM  LIPERET  KRUX  KRISTI 
SIT  SUPER  ME  ASAM  HIK  ET  UBIQUE 
-p  KHORDA  -p  IN  KHORDA  -p  KHORDAE 

(t)  (M)AGLA  -p  SANGUIS  KRISTI  SIGNET  ME 

RUNES,  A.  D.  iooo.*  « 


* This  cut  is  of  some  of  the  oldest  runes  known,  giving  two  lines  in  Danish  and  the  rest  in  Latin,  as  the 
transliteration  shows.  It  is  copied  from  The  oldest  yet  found  Document  in  Danish, by  Prof.  Dr.  George  Ste- 
fhens  (Copenhagen,  1888,  — from  the  Memoires  des  Antiquaires  du  Nord,  1887).  The  author  says  that  the 
leaden  tablet  on  which  the  runes  were  cut  was  found  in  Odense,  Fyn,  Denmark,  in  1883,  and  he  places  the 
date  of  it  about  the  year  a.  d.  1000.  » 

George  Stephens’s  Handbook  of  the  old  Northern  Runic  Monuments  of  Scandinavia  and  England  is  a 
condensation,  preserving  all  the  cuts,  and  .making  some  additions  to  his  larger  folio  work  in  3 vols.,  The 
old-northern  Runic  monuments  of  Scandinavia  and  England , now  first  collected  and  deciphered  (London, 
etc.,  1866-68).  It  does  not  contain  either  Icelandic  or  Greenland  runes.  He  says  that  by  the  time  of  the  col- 
onization of  Iceland  “ the  old  northern  runes  as  a system  had  died  out  on  the  Scandinavian  main,  and  were 
followed  by  the  later  runic  alphabet.  But  even  this  modern  Icelandic  of  the  tenth  century  has  not  come 
down  to  us.  If  it  had,  it  would  be  very  different  from  what  is  now  vulgarly  so  called,  which  is  the  greatly 
altered  Icelandic  of  the  thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries.  . . . The  oldest  written  Icelandic  known  to  us  is 
said  to  date  from*  about  the  year  1200.  . . . The  whole  modern  doctrine  of  one  uniform  Icelandic  language 
all  over  the  immense  north  in  the  first  one  thousand  winters  after  Christ  is  an  impossible  absurdity.  ...  It  is 
very  seldom  that  any  of  the  Scandinavian  runic  stones  bear  a date.  ...  No  Christian  runic  gravestone  is 
older  than  the  fourteenth  century.” 

On  runes  in  general,  see  Mallet,  Bohn’s  ed.,  pp.  227,  248,  following  the  cut  of  the  Kingektorsoak  stone,  in 
Rafn’s  Antiq.  Americana  ; Wilson’s  Prehist.  Man,  ii.  88  ; Wollheim’s  Nat.  Lit.  der  Scandinavier  (Bei- 
lin, 1875),  vol.  i.  pp.  2-15  ; Legis-Glueckselig’s  Die  Runen  und  Hire  Denkmaler  (Leipzig,  1S29) ; De  Costa  s 
Pre-Columb.  Disc.,  pp.  xxx  ; Revue  polit.  it  lit.,  Jan.  10,  :88o. 

It  is  held  that  runes  are  an  outgrowth  of  the  Latin  alphabet.  (L.  F.  A.  Wimmer’s  Runeskriftcns  Oprin 
dclse  og  Udvikling  i norden,  Copenhagen,  1874.) 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


67 


pation  on  the  soil,  but  nowhere  in  America,  except  on  an  island  on  the  east 
shore  of  Baffin’s  Bay,* 1  has  any  authentic  runic  inscription  been  found  out- 
side of  Greenland.  Not  a single  indisputable  grave  has  been  discovered  to 
attest  their  alleged  centuries  of  fitful  occupation.  The  consistent  and  natu- 
ral proof  of  any  occupation  of  America  south  of  Davis  Straits  is  therefore 
lacking ; and  there  is  not  sufficient  particularity  in  the  descriptions  2 to 
remove  the  suspicion  that  the  story-telling  of  the  fireside  has  overlaid  the 
reports  of  the  explorer.  Our  historic  sense  is  accordingly  left  to  consider, 
as  respects  the  most  general  interpretation,  what  weight  of  confidence 
should  be  yielded  to  the  sagas,  pre-Columbian  as  they  doubtless  are.  But 
beyond  this  is  perhaps,  what  is  after  all  the  most  satisfactory  way  of  solving 
the  problem,  a dependence  on  the  geographical  and  ethnical  probabilities 
of  the  case.  The  Norsemen  have  passed  into  credible  history  as  the  most 


ia  b c u c f b t k l ttl 

WUMZM1 1 1 Y, 

Ibrt  ofl  d t r it 

M Ed 


imKW  nmx: 

ALPHABETS*  CfCTHlCV: 


FROM  OLAUS  MAGNUS* 

hardy  and  venturesome  of  races.  That  they  colonized  Iceland  and  Green- 
land is  indisputable.  That  their  eager  and  daring  nature  should  have  de- 
serted them  at  this  point  is  hardly  conceivable.  Skirting  the  Greenland 
shores  and  inuring  themselves  to  the  hardships  and  excitements  of  northern 
voyaging,  there  was  not?  a long  stretch  of  open  sea  before  they  could  strike 
the  Labrador  coast.  It  was  a voyage  for  which  their  ships,  with  courageous 
crews,  were  not  unfitted.  Nothing  is  more  likely  than  that  some  ship  of 
theirs  may  have  been  blown  westerly  and  unwillingly  in  the  first  instance, 
just  as  Greenland  was  in  like  manner  first  made  known  to  the  Icelanders. 
The  coast  once  found,  to  follow  it  to  the  south  would  have  been  their  most 
consistent  action. 

We  may  consider,  then,  that  the  weight  of  probability  3 is  in  favor  of  a 
Northman  descent  upon  the  coast  of  the  American  mainland  at  some  point, 


1 Dated  1135,  and  discovered  in  1824.  3 On  the  probabilities  of  the  Vinland  voyages, 

2 Distinctly  shown  in  the  diverse  identifications  see  Worsaae’s  Danes  and  Norwegians  in  Eng- 

of  these  landmarks  which  have  been  made.  land,  etc.,  p.  109. 

* Fac-simile  of  a cut  to  the  chapter  “ De  Alphabeto  Gothorum  ” in  the  Historia  de  Gentibus  Septentrionali - 
bus  (Roma;,  M.D.LV.). 


68 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


or  at  several,  somewhere  to  the  south  of  Greenland  ; but  the  evidence  is 
hardly  that  which  attaches  to  well-established  historical  records. 

The  archaeological  traces,  which  are  lacking  farther  south,  are  abundant 
in  Greenland,  and  confirm  in  the  most  positive  way  the  Norse  occupation. 
The  ruins  of  churches  and  baptisteries  give  a color  of  truth  to  the  ecclesi- 
astical annals  which  have  come  down  to  us,  and  which  indicate  that  after 
having  been  for  more  than  a century  under  the  Bishop  of  Iceland,  a succes- 
sion of  bishops  of  its  own  was  established  there  early  in  the  twelfth  cen- 
tury. The  names  of  seventeen  prelates  are  given  by  Torfaeus,  though  it  is 
not  quite  certain  that  the  bishops  invariably  visited  their  see.  The  last 
known  to  have  filled  the  office  went  thither  in  the  early  years  of  the  fif- 
teenth century.  The  last  trace  of  him  is  in  the  celebration  of  a marriage 
at  Gardar  in  1409. 

The  Greenland  colonists  were  equipped  with  all  the  necessities  of  a perma- 
nent life.  They  had  horses,  sheep,  and  oxen,  and  beef  is  said  to  have  been 
a regular  article  of  export  to  Norway.  They  had  buildings  of  stone,  of  which 
the  remains  still  exist.  They  doubtless  brought  timber  from  the  south,  and 
we  have  in  runic  records  evidence  of  their  explorations  far  to  the  north. 
They  maintained  as  late  as  the  thirteenth  century  a regular  commercial  in- 
tercourse with  the  mother  country,1  but  this  trade  fell  into  disuse  when 
a royal  mandate  constituted  such  ventures  a monopoly  of  the  throne ; and 
probably  nothing  so  much*  conduced  to  the  decadence  and  final  extinction 
of  the  colonies  as  this  usurped  and  exclusive  trade,  which  cut  off  all  per- 
sonal or  conjoined  intercourse. 

The  direct  cause  of  the  final  extinction  of  the  Greenland  colonies  is  in- 
volved in  obscurity,  though  a variety  of  causes,  easily  presumable,  would 
have  been  sufficient,  when  we  take  into  consideration  the  moribund  con- 
dition into  which  they  naturally  fell  after  commercial  restriction  had  put  a 
stop  to  free  intercourse  with  the  home  government. 

The  Eskimos  are  said  to  have  appeared  in  Greenland  about  the  middle 
of  the  fourteenth  century,  and  to  have  manifested  hostility  to  such  a de- 
gree that  about  1342  the  imperilled  western  colony  was  abandoned.  The 
eastern  colony  survived  perhaps  seventy  years  longer,  or  possibly  to  a still 
later  period.  We  know  they  had  a new  bishop  in  1387,  but  before  the  end 
of  that  century  the  voyages  to  their  relief  were  conducted  only  after  long 
intervals. 

Before  communication  was  wholly  cut  off,  the  attacks  of  the  Skraelings, 
and  possibly  famine  and  the  black  death,  had  carried  the  struggling  colo- 
nists to  the  verge  of  destruction.  Bergen,  in  Norway,  upon  which  they  de- 
pended for  succor,  had  at  one  time  been  almost  depopulated  by  the  same 
virulent  disease,  and  again  had  been  ravaged  by  a Hanseatic  fleet.  Thus 
such  intercourse  as  the  royal  monopoly  permitted  had  become  precarious, 
and  the  marauding  of  freebooters,  then  prevalent  in  northern  waters,  still 
further  served  to  impede  the  communications,  till  at  last  they  wholly  ceased, 
during  the  early  years  of  the  fifteenth  century. 

1 Gronland's  Hist.  Mittdesmaeker,  iiL  9. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


6 9 


It  has  sometimes  been  maintained  that  the  closing  in  of  ice-packs  was 
the  final  stroke  which  extinguished  the  last  hopes  of  the  expiring  colonists.1 
This  view,  however,  meets  with  little  favor  among  the  more  enlightened 
students  of  climatic  changes,  like  Humboldt.2 

There  has  been  published  what  purports  to  be  a bull  of  Pope  Nicholas  V,3 
directing  the  Bishop  of  Iceland  to  learn  what  he  could  of  the  condition 
of  the  Greenland  colonies,  and  in  this  document  it  is  stated  that  part  of 
the  colonists  had  been  destroyed  by  barbarians  thirty  years  before,  — the 
bull  bearing  date  in  1448.  There  is  no  record  that  any  expedition  followed 
upon  this  urging,  and  there  is  some  question  as  to  the  authenticity  of  the 
document.4  In  the  Relation  of  La  Peyrere  there  is  a story  of  some  sailors 
visiting  Greenland  so  late  as  1484;  but  it  is  open  to  question. 


Early  in  the  sixteenth  century  fitful  efforts  to  learn  the  fate  of  the  colonies 
began,  and  these  were  continued,  without  result,  well  into  the  seventeenth 
century;  but  nothing  explicable  was  ascertained  till,  in  1721,  Hans  Egede, 
a Norwegian  priest,  prevailed  upon  the  Danish  government  to  send  him  on 
a mission  to  the  Eskimos.  He  went,  accompanied  by  wife  and  children  ; 
and  the  colony  of  Godthaab,  and  the  later  history  of  the  missions,  and  the 
revival  of  trade  with  Europe,  attest  the  constancy  of  his  purpose  and  the 
fruits  of  his  earnestness.  In  a year  he  began  to  report  upon  certain 
remains  which  indicated  the  former  occupation  of  the  country  by  people 
who  built  such  buildings  as  was  the  habit  in  Europe.  He  and  his  son  Paul 


their  successors  in  the 

1 The  popular  confidence  in  this  view  is  doubt- 
less helped  by  Montgomery,  who  has  made  it  a 
point  in  his  poem  on  Greenland,  canto  v.  De 
Courcy  ( Hist . of  the  Church  in  America,  p.  12) 
is  cited  by  Howley  ( Newfoundland ) as  assert- 
ing that  the  eastern  colony  was  destroyed  by 
“a  physical  cataclysm,  which  accumulated  the 
ice.”  On  the  question  of  a change  of  climate  in 
Greenland,  see  J.  D.  Whitney’s  Climatic  Changes 
(Mus.  Comp.  Zoiil.  Mem.,  1882,  vii.  238). 

2 Rink  ( Danish  Greenland,  22)  is  not  inclined 
to  believe  that  there  has  been  any  material  cli- 
matic change  in  Greenland  since  the  Norse  days, 
and  favors  the  supposition  that  some  portion  of 
the  finally  remaining  Norse  became  amalgamated 
with  the  Eskimo  and  disappeared.  If  the  reader 
wants  circumstantial  details  of  the  misfortunes 
of  their  “ last  man,”  he  can  see  how  they  can  be 
made  out  of  what  are  held  to  be  Eskimo  tradi- 
tions in  a chapter  of  Dr.  Hayes’s  Land  of  Deso- 
lation. 

Nordenskjold  ( Voyage  of  the  Vega)  holds,  such 
is  the  rapid  assimilation  of  a foreign  stock  by  a 
native  stock,  that  it  is  not  unlikely  that  what 
descendants  may  exist  of  the  lost  colonists  of 
Greenland  may  be  now  indistinguishable  from 
the  Eskimo. 


missions,  gathered  for  us,  first  among 

Tylor  ( Early  Hist.  Mankind,  p.  208),  speaking 
of  the  Eskimo,  says:  “ It  is  indeed  very  strange 
that  there  should  be  no  traces  found  among  them 
of  knowledge  of  metal-work  and  of  other  arts, 
which  one  would  expect  a race  so  receptive  of 
foreign  knowledge  would  have  got  from  contact 
with  the  Northmen.” 

Prof.  Edward  S.  Morse,  in  his  very  curious 
study  of  Ancient  and  Modern  Methods  of  Arrow 
Release  (Salem,  1885, — Bull.  Essex  Inst.,  xvii.) 
p.  52,  notes  that  the  Eskimo  are  the  only  North 
American  tribe  practising  what  he  calls  the 
“ Mediterranean  release,”  common  to  all  civil- 
ized Europe,  and  he  ventures  to  accept  a sur- 
mise that  it  may  have  been  derived  from  the 
Scandinavians. 

3 Given  by  Schlegel,  Egede  (citing  Pontanus), 
and  Rafn  ; and  a French  version  is  in  the  Bull, 
de  la  Soc.  de  GSog.,  2d  series,  iii.  348.  It  is  said 
to  be  preserved  in  a copy  in  the  Vatican.  M. 
F.  Howley,  Ecclesiastical  Hist,  of  Nesvfoundland 
(Boston,  1888),  p.  43,  however,  says:  “Abbe 
Gamier  mentions  a bull  of  Pope  Nicholas  V,  of 
date  about  1447,  concerning  the  church  of  Green- 
land; but  on  searching  the  Bullarium  in  the 
Propaganda  library,  Rome,  in  1885,  I could  not 
find  it.” 

4 Laing’s  Heimskringla,  i.  146. 


70 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


modern  searchers,  the  threads  of  the  history  of  this  former  people ; and, 
as  time  went  on,  the  researches  of  Graah,  Nordenskjold,  and  other  ex- 
plorers, and  the  studious  habits  of  Major,  Rink,  and  the  rest  among  the  in- 

D E I COMMENTARII  DEL 
ViasgioinPerfa  di  M.  Cdterm  Zeno  il  K. 
grctcUejmerre fdtte  nell’lmperio~Perfidno, 
ddl  tempo  di  VffuncdJJdno  m qua . 

LIB  8. 1 DVE. 

ET  D ELL  O S COP  R I ME  NTO 
dell’lfoleFvisldnddjEsldnddjEnvrouetdiiddjEfto 
tildudd,  & Icdridjfdttofottv  d Polo  ^frtico.dd 
due  frdtelli  z ent}  M.  Nicol'oil  K.e  M.^fntomo. 

LIBR.O  VNO. 

CON  VN  DISEGNO  PARTI  C OLAR,  E DI 

turn  ledette pdrte  di  jrdmontdud  dd  lor Jcoperte. 

CON  GRATIA,  ET  PR-IVILEGIO. 


vestigators,  have  enabled  us  to  read  the  old  sagas  of  the  colonization  of 
Greenland  with  renewed  interest  and  with  the  light  of  corroborating 
evidence.1 

We  are  told  that  it  was  one  result  of  these  Northman  voyages  that  the 

1 E.  B.  Tylor  on  “ Old  Scandinavian  Civiliza-  Their  recollection  of  the  Northmen  seems  evi- 
tion  among  the  modern  Esquimaux,”  in  the  dent  from  the  traditions  collected  among  them 
Journal  of  the  Anthropological  Inst.  (1884),  xiii.  by  Dr.  Rink  in  his  Eskimoiske  Eventyr  og  Sagn 
348,  shows  that  the  Greenlanders  still  preserve  (Copenhagen,  1866) ; and  their  dress,  and  some 
some  of  the  Norse  customs,  arising  in  part,  as  of  their  utensils  and  games,  as  it  existed  in  the 
he  thinks,  from  some  of  the  lost  Scandinavian  days  of  Egede  and  Crantz,  seem  to  indicate  the 
survivors  being  merged  in  the  savage  tribes,  survival  of  customs. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


71 


fame  of  them  spread  to  other  countries,  and  became  known  among  the 
Welsh,  at  a time  when,  upon  the  death  of  Owen  Gwynedd,  who  ruled  in 
the  northern  parts  of  that  country,  the  people  were  embroiled  in  civil  strife. 
That  chieftain’s  son,  Prince  Madoc,  a man  bred  to  the  sea,  was  discontented 
with  the  unstable  state  of  society,  and  resolved  to  lead  a colony  to  these 

DELLO  S COT?  R I ME  NTO  DEL 
l’ I foie  Fr  island* , Eslanda^Engroueland  EJIq • 
tilandaiOi  Icaria^fatto  per  due  fr  at  el- 
li  ZeniM.  Nicold  il  Cauahere ,<& 

M>  Antonio  Libro  Vno,  col  di- 
fegno  di  dette  ifole  » 


dugento  armi  del 
la  noflra  falute 
fe  molto  famofo 
in  Vcnetia  M% 
m arin  z eno  chi* 
mato  per  la  Jua 
gran  uirtu,et  de 
(Irezjza  d’inge 
gno  podefla  in 
alcune  Repnblt.  d’ Italia  j ne’gouerni  dellequali  fi 
forth  fempre  cofi  bene , che  era  amato  & gran - 
demente  riuerito  il  fuo  nome  da  cpuedi  anco  , che 
lion  I’haueuano  mat  per  prefenza  conofciuto;e  tr* 

I’altre  fue  belle  opere  particdamente  fi  narra^ 

western  lands,  where  they  could  live  more  in  peace.  Accordingly,  in  a.  d. 
1170,  going  seaward  on  a preliminary  exploration  by  the  south  of  Ireland, 
he  steered  west,  and  established  a pioneer  colony  in  a fertile  land.  Leaving 
here  120  persons,  he  returned  to  Wales,  and  fitted  out  a larger  expedition 
of  ten  ships,  with  which  he  again  sailed,  and  passed  out  of  view  forever. 
The  evidence  in  support  of  this  story  is  that  it  is^  mentioned  in  early 

Note.  — The  cuts  above  are  fac-similes  of  the  title  and  of  the  first  page  of  the  section  on  Frisland,  etc.,  from 
the  Harvard  College  copy.  The  book  is  rare.  The  Beckford  copy  brought  £50 ; the  Hamilton,  £38 ; the 
Tross  catalogue  (1882)  price  one  at  150  francs;  the  Tweitmeyer,  Leipzig,  1888,  at  250  marks;  Quaritch 
(1885),  at  £25.  Cf.  Court  Catalogue,  no.  378 ; Leclerc,  no.  3002;  Dufoss6,  no.  4965;  Carter-Brown,  i.  226  J 
Murphy,  nos.  2798-99.  The  map  is  often  in  fac-simile,  as  in  the  Harvard  College  copy. 


72 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Welsh  annals,  and  that  sundry  persons  have  discovered  traces  of  the  Welsh 
tongue  among  the  lighter-colored  American  Indians,  to  say  nothing  of 
manifold  legends  among  the  Indians  of  an  original  people,  white  in  color, 
coming  from  afar  towards  the  northeast,  — proofs  not  sufficient  to  attract 
the  confidence  of  those  who  look  for  historical  tests,  though,  as  Humboldt 
contends,1  there  may  be  no  impossibility  in  the  story. 


There  seems  to  be  a general  agreement  that  a crew  of  Arabs,  somewhere 
about  the  eleventh  or  twelfth  century,  explored  the  Atlantic  westward, 
with  the  adventurous  purpose  of  finding  its  further  limits,  and  that  they 
reached  land,  which  may  have  been  the  Canaries,  or  possibly  the  Azores, 
though  the  theory  that  they  succeeded  in  reaching  America  is  not  without 
advocates.  The  main  source  of  the  belief  is  the  historical  treatise  of  the 
Arab  geographer  Edrisi,  whose  work  was  composed  about  the  middle  of 
the  twelfth  century.2 

In  the  latter  part  of  the  fourteenth  century,3  as  the  story  goes,  two 
brothers  of  Venice,  Nicolo  and  Antonio  Zeno,  being  on  a voyage  in  the 
North  Atlantic  were  wrecked  there,  and  lived  for  some  years  at  Frislanda, 
and  visited  Engroneland.  During  this  northern  sojourn  they  encountered 
a sailor,  who,  after  twenty-six  years  of  absence,  had  returned,  and  reported 
that  the  ship  in  which  he  was  had  been  driven  west  in  a gale  to  an  island, 
where  he  found  civilized  people,  who  possessed  books  in  Latin  and  could 
not  speak  Norse,  and  whose  country  was  called  Estotiland ; while  a region 
on  the  mainland,  farther  south,  to  which  he  had  also  gone,  was  called 
Drogeo,  and  that  here  he  had  encountered  cannibals.  Still  farther  south 
was  a great  country  with  towns  and  temples.  This  information,  picked  up 
by  these  exiled  Zeni,  was  finally  conveyed  to  another  brother  in  Venice, 
accompanied  by  a map  of  these  distant  regions.  These  documents  long 


1 Cosmos,  Bohn’s  ed.,  ii.  610;  Examen  Crit., 
ii.  148. 

2 Cf.  Geographic  de  Edrisi,  traduite  de  I'arabe 
en  fratifais  d'apris  deux  manuscrits  de  la  bib - 
liothique  du  Roi,  et  accompagnee  de  notes,  par 
G.  Amedee  Jaubert  (Paris,  1836-40),  vol.  i.  200; 
ii.  26.  Cf.  Recueil  des  Voyages  et  Memoires  de 
la  Societl  de  Geographic  de  Paris,  vols.  v.,  vi. 
The  world-map  by  Edrisi  does  not  indicate  any 
knowledge  of  this  unknown  world.  Cf.  copies 
of  it  in  St.  Martin’s  Atlas,  pi.  vi ; Lelewel,  Atlas, 
pi.  x-xii ; Peschel’s  Gesch.  der  Erdkunde,  ed. 
by  Ruge,  1877,  p.  144;  Amer.  Geog.  Soc.  Jour- 
nal, xii.  1 8 1 ; Allg.  Geog.  Ephemeriden,  ix.  292  ; 
Gerard  Stein’s  Die  Entdeckungsreisen  in  alter 
und  neuer  Zeit  (1883). 

Guignes  (Mem.  Acad,  des  Inscriptions,  1761, 
xxviii.  524)  limits  the  Arab  voyage  to  the  Cana- 
ries, and  in  Notices  et  Extraits  des  MSS.  de  la 
bibliothlque  du  Roi,  ii.  24,  he  describes  a MS. 
which  makes  him  believe  the  Arabs  reached 
America  ; and  he  is  followed  by  Munoz  (Hist. 


del  Nuevo  Mondo,  Madrid,  1793).  Hugh  Murray 
(Discoveries  and  Travels  in  No.  Amer.,  Lond., 
1829,  i.  p.  11)  and  W.  D.  Cooley  (Maritime 
Discovery,  1830,  i.  172)  limit  the  explorations 
respectively  to  the  Azores  and  the  Canaries. 
Humboldt  (Examen  Crit.,  1837,  ii.  137)  thinks 
they  may  possibly  have  reached  the  Canaries ; 
but  Malte  Brun  (Geog.  Universelle,  1841,  i.  186) 
is  more  positive.  Major  (Select  Letters  of  Co- 
lumbus, 1847)  discredits  the  American  theory, 
and  in  his  Prince  Henry  agrees  with  D’Avezac 
that  they  reached  Madeira.  Lelewel  (Geog.  du 
Moyen  Age,  ii.  78)  seems  likewise  incredulous. 
S.  F.  Haven  (Archceol.  U.  S.)  gives  the  theory 
and  enumerates  some  of  its  supporters.  Pe- 
schel  ( Geschichte  des  Zeitalters  der  Entdeckungen, 
1858)  is  very  sceptical.  Gaffarel  (Etudes,  etc., 
p.  209)  fails  to  find  proof  of  the  American 
theory.  Gay  (Pop.  History  U.  S.,  i.  64)  limits 
their  voyage  to  the  Azores. 

3  Given  as  A.  D.  1380  ; but  Major  says,  1390 
Journal  Royal  Geog.  Soc.,  1873,  p.  180. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


73 


remained  in  the  family  palace  in  Venice,  and  were  finally  neglected  and 
became  obscured,  until  at  last  a descendant  of  the  family  compiled  from 
them,  as  best  he  could,  a book,  which  was  printed  in  Venice  in  1558  as 
Dei  Commentarii  del  Viaggio,  which  was  accompanied  by  a map  drawn 
with  difficulty  from  the  half  obliterated  original  which  had  been  sent  from 
Frislanda.1  The  original  documents  were  never  produced,  and  the  publica- 
tion took  place  opportunely  to  satisfy  current  curiosity,  continually  incited 


SHIP  OF  THE  FIFTEENTH  CENTURY* 


1 De  Costa,  Verrazano  the  Explorer  (N.  Y., 
1880),  pp.  47,  63,  contends  that  Benedetto  Bor- 
done,  writing  his  Isole  del  Mondo  in  1521,  and 
printing  it  in  1528,  had  access  to  the  Zeno  map 
thirty  years  and  more  earlier  than  its  publica- 
tion. This,  he  thinks,  is  evident  from  the  way 
in  which  he  made  and  filled  in  his  outline,  and 
from  his  drawing  of  “ Islanda,”  even  to  a like  way 
of  engraving  the  name,  which  is  in  a style  of 
letter  used  by  Bordone  nowhere  else.  Hum- 
boldt (Cosmos,  Bohn’s  ed.,  ii.  61 1)  has  also  re- 
marked it  as  singular  that  the  name  Frislanda, 
which,  as  he  supposed,  was  not  known  on  the 
maps  before  the  Zeni  publication  in  1538,  should 
have  been  applied  by  Columbus  to  an  island 
southerly  from  Iceland,  in  his  Tratado  de  las 


cinco  zonas  habitables.  Cf.  De  Costa’s  Columbus 
and  the  Geographers  of  the  North  (1872),  p.  19. 
Of  course,  Columbus  might  have  used  the  name 
simply  descriptively,  — cold  land  ; but  it  is  now 
known  that  in  a sea  chart  of  perhaps  the  fifteenth 
century,  preserved  in  the  Ambrosian  library  at 
Milan,  the  name  “Fixlanda”  is  applied  to  an 
island  in  the  position  of  Frislanda  in  the  Zeno 
chart,  while  in  a Catalan  chart  of  the  end  of  the 
fifteenth  century  the  same  island  is  apparently 
called  “ Frixlanda  ” (Studi  biog.  e bibliog.  della 
soc.  geog.  ital.,  ii.  nos.  400,  404).  “Frixanda” 
is  also  on  a chart,  A.  D.  1471-83,  given  in  fac- 
simile to  accompany  Wuttke’s  “ Geschichte  der 
Erdkunde  ” in  the  Jahrbuch  des  Vereins  fur 
Erdkunde  (Dresden,  1870,  tab.  vi.). 


* From  the  Isolario  (Venice,  1547). 


74 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


by  the  Spanish  discoveries.  It  was  also  calculated  to  appeal  to  the  national 
pride  of  Italy,  which  had  seen  Spain  gain  the  glory  of  her  own  sons,  Colum- 
bus and  Vespucius,  if  it  could  be  established  that  these  distant  regions,  of 
which  the  Zeni  brothers  so  early  reported  tidings,  were  really  the  great 
new  world.1  The  cartography  of  the  sixteenth  century  shows  that  the 
narrative  and  its  accompanying  map  made  an  impression  on  the  public 
mind,  but  from  that  day  to  this  it  has  been  apparent  that  there  can  be  no 
concurrence  of  opinion  as  to  what  island  the  Frislanda  of  the  Zeni  was,  if 
it  existed  at  all  except  in  some  disordered  or  audacious  mind  ; and,  as  a 
matter  of  course,  the  distant  regions  of  Estotiland  and  Drogeo  have  been 
equally  the  subject  of  belief  and  derision.  No  one  can  be  said  wholly  to 
have  taken  the  story  out  of  the  category  of  the  uncertain. 


THE  SEA  OF  DARKNESS. 
(From  Olaus  Magnus.) 


The  presence  of  the  Basques  on  the  coasts  of  North  America  long  be- 
fore the  voyage  of  Columbus  is  often  asserted,2  and  there  is  no  improba- 
bility in  a daring  race  of  seamen,  in  search  of  whales,  finding  a way  to 
the  American  waters.  There  are  some  indications  in  the  early  cartography 
which  can  perhaps  be  easily  explained  on  this  hypothesis  ; 3 there  are  said 
to  be  unusual  linguistic  correspondences  in  the  American  tongues  with 
those  of  this  strange  people.4  There  are  the  reports  of  the  earliest  navi- 


1 Irving’s  Columbus  takes  this  view. 

2 L P.  Leslie’s  Man's  Origin  and  Destiny , p. 
1 14,  for  instance. 

3 Brevoort  [Hist.  Mag.,  xiii.  45)  thinks  that 
the  “ Isola  Verde  ” and  “ Isle  de  Mai  ” of  the 
fifteenth-century  maps,  lying  in  lat.  46°  north, 
was  Newfoundland  with  its  adjacent  bank,  which 
he  finds  in  one  case  represented.  Samuel  Rob- 
ertson ( Lit.  &=■  Hist.  Soc.  Quebec , Trans.  Jan.  16) 
goes  so  far  as  to  say  that  certain  relics  found  in 

Canada  may  be  Basque,  and  that  it  was  a Basque 
whaler,  named  Labrador,  who  gave  the  name 


to  the  coast,  which  the  early  Portuguese  found 
attached  to  it ! We  find  occasional  stories  indi- 
cating knowledge  of  distant  fishing  coasts  at  a 
very  early  date,  like  the  following  : — 

“ In  the  yeere  1 1 53  it  is  written  that  there  came 
to  Lubec,  a citie  of  Germanie,  one  canoa  with 
certaine  indians,  like  unto  a long  barge,  which 
seemed  to  have  come  from  the  coast  of  Bacca- 
laos,  which  standeth  in  the  same  latitude  that 
Germanie  doth  ” ( Galvano , Bethune’s  edition, 
p.  56). 

4  W.  D.  Whitney,  Life  and  Growth  of  Latv 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


75 


gators,  who  have  left  indisputable  records  that  earlier  visitors  from  Europe 
had  been  before  them,  and  Cabot  may  have  found  some  reminders  of  such  j1 
and  it  is  even  asserted  that  ifc  was  a Basque  mariner,  who  had  been  on  the 
Newfoundland  banks,  and  gave  to  Columbus  some  premonitions  of  the  New 
World.2 

Certain  claims  of  the  Dutch  have  also  been  advanced  ; 3 ai^d  one  for  an 
early  discovery  of  Newfoundland,  in  1463-64,  by  John  Vas  Costa  Corte- 
real  was  set  forth  by  Barrow  in  his  Chronological  Hist,  of  Voyages  into  the 
Arctic  Regions  (London,  1818)  ; but  he  stands  almost  alone  in  his  belief.4 
Biddle  in  his  Cabot  has  shown  its  great  improbability. 

In  the  years  while  Columbus  was  nourishing  his  purpose  of  a western  voy- 
age, there  were  two  adventurous  navigators,  as  alleged,  who  were  breasting 
the  dangers  of  the  Sea  of  Darkness  both  to  the  north  and  to  the  south.  It 


gicage,  p.  258,  says  : “ No  other  dialect  of  the  old 
world  so  much  resembles  in  structure  the  Amer- 
ican languages.”  Cf.  Farrar’s  Families  of  Speech, 
p.  132;  Nott  and  Gliddon’s  Indigenous  Races, 
48  ; H.  de  Charencey’s  Des  ajfinit'es  de  la  langue 
Basque  avec  les  idiomes  du  Nouveau  Monde 
(Paris  and  Caen,  1867) ; and  Julien  Vinson’s  “ La 
langue  basque  et  les  langues  Americaines  ” in 
the  Compte  Rendu,  Congres  des  Americanistes 
(Nancy,  1875),  ii.  46.  On  the  other  hand,  Joly 
( Man  before  Metals,  316)  says:  “ Whatever  may 
be  said  to  the  contrary,  Basque  offers  no  analogy 
with  the  American  dialects.” 

These  linguistic  peculiarities  enter  into  all  the 
studies  of  this  remarkable  stock.  Cf.  J.  F. 
Blade’s  Etude  sur  Vorigine  des  Basques  (Paris, 
1869) ; W.  B.  Dawkins  in  the  Fortnightly  Re- 
view, Sept.,  1874,  and  his  Cave  Hunting,  ch.  6, 
with  Brabrook’s  critique  in  the  Journal  Anthro- 
pological Institute,  v.  5 ; and  Julien  Vinson  on 
“ L’Ethnographie  des  Basques  ” in  Mem.  de  la 
Soc.  d’ Ethnographie,  Session  de  1872,  p.  49,  with 
a map. 

1 But  see  Vol.  III.  45  ; IV.  3.  Forster  (. North- 
ern Voyages,  book  iii.  ch.  3 and  4)  contends  for 
these  pre-Columbian  visits  of  the  European  fish- 
ermen. Cf.  Winsor’s  Bibliog.  of  Ptolemy,  sub 
anno  1508.  The  same  currents  and  easterly 
trade-winds  which  helped  Columbus  might  ea- 
sily have  carried  chance  vessels  to  the  American 
coasts,  as  we  have  evidence,  apparently,  in  the 
stern-post  of  a European  vessel  which  Colum- 
bus saw  at  Guadaloupe.  Haven  cites  Gumilla 
(Hist.  Orinoco,  ii.  208)  as  stating  that  in  1731  a 
bateau  from  Teneriffe  was  thrown  upon  the 
South  American  coast.  Cf.  J.  P.  Casselius,  De 
Navigationibus fortuitis  in  America:n,  ante  Colum- 
bum  fictis  (Magdeburg,  1742) ; Brasseur’s  Popin 
Vuh,  introd.  ; Hunt’s  Merchants’  Mag.  xxv.  275. 

2 Francisque- Michel,  Le  Pays  Basque,  189, 
. who  says  that  the  Basques  were  acquainted  with 

the  coasts  of  Newfoundland  a century  before 
Columbus  (ch.  9). 


Humboldt  (Cos/nos,  Eng.  ed.  ii.  142)  is  not 
prepared  to  deny  such  early  visits  of  the  Basques 
to  the  northern  fishing  grounds.  Cf.  Gaffarel’s 
Rapport,  p.  212.  Harrisse  ( Notes  on  Columbus, 
80)  goes  back  very  far : “ The  Basques  and 
Northmen,  we  feel  confident,  visited  these  shores 
as  early  as  the  seventh  century.” 

There  are  some  recent  studies  on  these  early 
fishing  experiences  in  Ferd.  Duro’s  Disquisi- 
ciones  nauticas  (1881),  and  in  E.  Gelcich’s  “ Der 
Fischgang  des  Gascogner  und  die  Entdeckung 
von  Neufundland,”  in  the  Zeitschrift  der  Gc- 
sellschaft  fiir  Erdkunde  zu  Berlin  (1883),  vol. 
xviii.  pp.  249-287. 

3 Cf.  M.  Hamconius’  Frisia:  seu  de  viris  er- 
busque  Frisia  illustribus  (Franckerae,  1620),  and 
L.  Ph.  C.  v.  d.  Bergh’s  Ncderlands  annspraak  op 
de  ontdekking  van  Amerika  voor  Columbus  (Arn- 
heim,  1850).  Cf.  Muller’s  Catalogue  (1877),  nos. 
3°3.  r343- 

4 Watson’s  bibliog.  in  Anderson,  p.  158. 

A Biscayan  merchant,  a subject  of  Navarre,  is 
also  said  to  have  discovered  the  western  lands 
in  1444.  Cf.  Andre  Favyn,  Hist,  de  Navarre,  p. 
564  ; and  G.  de  Henao’s  AvcrigJiaciones  de  las 
Antigiicdades  de  Cantabria,  p.  25. 

Galvano  (Hakluyt  Soc.  ed.,  p.  72)  recounts 
the  story  of  a Portuguese  ship  in  1447  being 
driven  westward  from  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar  to 
an  island  with  seven  cities,  where  they  found  the 
people  speaking  Portuguese  ; who  said  they  had 
deserted  their  country  on  the  death  of  King 
Roderigo.  “ All  these  reasons  seem  to  agree,” 
adds  Galvano,  “ that  this  should  be  that  country 
which  is  called  Nova  Spagna.” 

It  was  the  year  ( 1491 ) before  Columbus’  voyage 
that  the  English  began  to  send  out  from  Bristol 
expeditions  to  discover  these  islands  of  the  seven 
cities,  and  others  having  the  same  legendary  ex- 
istence. Cf.  Ayala,  the  Spanish  ambassador  to 
England,  in  Spanish  State  Papers,  i.  177.  Cf. 
also  Irving’s  Columbus,  app.  xxiv.,  and  Gaf- 
farel’s Etude  sur  la  rapports,  etc.,  p.  185. 


76 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


cannot  be  said  that  either  the  Pole  Skolno,  in  his  skirting  the  Labrador  coasts 
in  1476, 1 or  the  Norman  Cousin,  who  is  thought  to  have  traversed  a part  of 
the  South  American  coast  in  1488-89, 2 have  passed  with  their  exploits 
into  the  accepted  truths  of  history  ; but  there  was  nothing  improbable  in 
what  was  said  of  them,  and  they  flourish  as  counter-rumors  always  survive 
when  attendant  upon  some  great  revelation  like  that  of  Columbus. 


1 See  Vol.  II.  p.  34. 

2 See  Vol.  II.  p.  34,  where  is  a list  of  refer- 
ences, which  may  be  increased  as  follows : Ba- 
chiller  y Morales,  Aniigiiedades  Americanas  (Ha- 
vana, 1845).  E.  de  Freville’s  Memoir e stir  le  Com- 
merce maritime  de  Rouen  (1857),  i.  328,  and  his 


La  Cosmographie  du  moyen  age , et  les  decouvertes 
maritimes  des  Normands  (Paris,  i860),  taken 
from  the  Revue  des  Societes  Savantes.  Gabriel 
Gravier’s  Les  Normands  sur  la  route  des  Indes , 
(Rouen,  1880).  Cf.  Congres  des  Americanistes  in 
Compte  Rendu  (1875),  '•  397- 


CRITICAL  NOTES  ON  THE  SOURCES  OF  INFORMATION. 


A.  Early  Connection  of  Asiatic  Peoples 
with  the  Western  Coast  of  America. — 
The  question  of  the  origin  of  the  Americans, 
whether  an  autochthonous  one  or  associated 
with  the  continents  beyond  either  ocean,  is  more 
properly  discussed  in  another  place  of  the  pres- 
ent volume.  We  can  only  indicate  here  in 
brief  such  of  the  phases  of  the  question  as  sup- 
pose ar.  Asiatic  connection,  and  the  particular 
lines  of  communication. 

The  ethnic  unity  of  the  American  races,  as 
urged  by  Morton  and  others,  hardly  meets  the 
requirements  of  the  problem  in  the  opinion  of 
most  later  students,  like  Sir  Daniel  Wilson,  for 
instance;  and  yet,  if  A.  H.  Keane  represents,  as 
he  claims,  the  latest  ethnological  beliefs,  the 
connection  with  Asia,  of  the  kind  that  forms 
ethnic  traces,  must  have  been  before  the  history 
of  the  present  Asiatic  races,  since  the  corre- 
spondence of  customs,  etc.  is  not  sufficient  for 
more  recent  affiliation.1  It  should  be  remem- 
bered also,  that  if  this  is  true,  and  if  there  is 


the  strong  physical  resemblance  between  Asi- 
atics and  the  indigenous  tribes  of  the  northwest 
coast  which  early  travellers  and  physiologists 
have  dwelt  on,  we  have  in  such  a correspondence 
strong  evidence  of  the  persistency  of  types.2 

The  Asiatic  theory  was  long  a favorite  one. 
So  popular  a book  as  Lafitau’s  Mceurs  des  Sau- 
vages  (Paris,  1724)  advocated  it.  J.  B.  Sche- 
rer’s Rechcrches  historiques  et  geographiques  sur 
le  nouveau  monde  (Paris,  1777)  was  on  the 
same  side.  One  of  the  earliest  in  this  country, 
Benj.  Smith  Barton,  to  give  expression  to  Amer- 
ican scholarship  in  this  field  held  like  opinions 
in  his  Nevj  Views  of  the  Origin  of  the  Tribes  of 
America  (Philad.,  1797).3 * * *  Twenty  years  later 
(1816)  one  of  the  most  active  of  the  American 
men  of  letters  advocated  the  same  views, — 
Samuel  L.  Mitchell  in  the  A rchaologia  Ameri- 
cana (i.  325,  338,  346).  The  weightiest  author- 
ity of  his  time,  Alex,  von  Humboldt,  formu- 
lated his  belief  in  several  of  his  books : Vues 
des  Cordilllres  ; A nsichten  der  Natur  ; Cosmos* 


1 “ Ethnography  and  Philology  of  America,”  in  H.  W.  Bates , Central  America,  West  Indies,  and  South 
America  (Lond.,  1882).  This  was  the  opinion  of  Prescott  {Mexico,  Kirk’s  ed.,  iii.  398),  and  he  based  his 
judgment  on  the  investigations  of  Waldeck,  Voyage  dans  la  Yucatan,  and  Dupaix,  Antiquites  Mexicaines. 
Stephens  {Central  America)  holds  similar  views.  Cf.  Wilson,  Prehistoric  Man,  i.  327  ; ii.  43.  Dali  {Third 
Rep.  Bur.  Ethnol.,  146)  says : “ There  can  be  no  doubt  that  America  was  populated  in  some  way  by  people 
of  an  extremely  low  grade  of  culture  at  a period  even  geologically  remote.  There  is  no  reason  for  supposing, 
however,  that  immigration  ceased  with  these  original  people.” 

2 Cf.  references  in  H.  H.  Bancroft's  A7 a five  Races,  v.  39;  Amerika' s Nordwest  Kiiste ; Ncuestc  Ergcbnisse 
ethnologischer  Reisen  (Berlin,  1883),  and  the  English  version,  The  Northwest  Coast  of  America.  Being 
Results  of  Recent  Ethnological  Researches  from  the  collections  of  the  Royal  Museums  at  Berlin . Pub- 
lished by  the  Directors  of  the  Ethnological  Department  (New  York,  1883). 

3 Cf.  his  Observations  on  some  remains  of  antiquity  (1796). 

1 Different  shades  of  belief  are  abundant : F.  Xavier  de  Orrio’s  Solucion  del  gran  problema  (Mexico, 

1763)  ; Fischer’s  Conjecture  sur  I'origine  des  Americaines ; Adair’s  Amer.  Indians  ; G.  A.  Thompson’s  A ew 

theory  of  the  two  hemispheres  (London,  1815);  Adam  Hodgson’s  Letters  from  No.  Amer.  (Lond.,  1824); 

J.  H.  McCulloh’s  Researches  (Balt.,  1829),  ch.  10 ; D.  B.  Warden’s  “ Recherches  sur  les  Antiquites  de 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


77 


Of  the  northern  routes,  that  by  Behring’s  have  not  far  from  the  same  dimensions,  he  saw 
Straits  is  the  most  apparent,  and  Lyell  says  both  the  English  and  French  shores  at  the 
that  when  half-way  over  Dover  Straits,  which  same  time,  he  was  easily  convinced  that  the 


l’Am^rique”  in  the  Antiquitcs  Mcxicaines  (Paris,  1834),  vol.  ii. ; E.  G.  Squier’s  Serpent  Symbol  (N.  Y., 
1851)  ; Brasseur  de  Bourbourg’s  Hist,  des  Nations  Civilisees,  i.  7 ; Jose  Perez  in  Revue  Orientals  ct  A?neri- 
caine  (Paris,  1862),  vol.  viii. ; Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  v.  30,  31,  with  references;  WincheH’s  Prcadamitcs, 
397 ; a paper  on  Asiatic  tribes  in  North  America,  in  Canadian  Institute  Proceedings  (1881),  i.  I7t.  Dabry 
de  Thiersant,  in  his  Originc  des  Indiens  du  nouv.  monde  (Paris,  1883),  reopens  the  question,  and  Quatrefages 
even  brings  the  story  of  Moncacht-Ape  (see  post , Vol.  V.  p.  77)  to  support  a theory  of  frequent  Asiatic 
communication.  Tylor  ( Early  Hist.  Mankind,  209)  says  that  the  Asiatics  must  have  taught  the  Mexicans 
to  make  bronze  and  smelt  iron  ; and  (p.  339)  he  finds  additional  testimony  in  the  correspondence  of  myths, 
but  Max  Muller  {Chips,  ii.  168)  demurs.  Nadaillac,  in  his  V Amerique prehistorique,  discussed  this  with  the 
other  supposable  connections  of  the  American  people,  and  generally  disbelieved  in  them ; but  Dali,  in  the  Eng- 
lish translation,  summarily  dismisses  all  consideration  of  them  as  unworthy  a scientific  mind ; but  points  out 
what  the  early  Indian  traditions  are  (p.  526). 

A good  deal  of  stress  has  been  laid  at  times  on  certain  linguistic  affiliations.  Barton,  in  his  New  Views, 
sought  to  strengthen  the  case  by  various  comparative  vocabularies.  Charles  Farcy  went  over  the  proofs  in  his 
Antiquitcs  de  l' Amerique : Discutcr  la  valcur  des  documents  relatifs  h Vhistoire  de  l' Amerique  avant  la 
conquete  des  Europccns,  et  determiner  s’il  existe  des  rapports  entre  les  langues  de  l' Amerique  et  celles 
des  tribus  de  VAfrique  et  de  V A sic  (Paris,  1836).  H.  H.  Bancroft  (Native  Races,  v.  39)  enumerates  the 
sources  of  the  controversy.  Roehrig  (Smithsonian  Report,  1872)  finds  affinities  in  the  languages  of  the 
Dakota  or  Sioux  Indians.  Pilling  ( Bibliog . of  Siouan  languages,  p.  11)  gives  John  Campbell’s  contribu- 
tions to  this  comparative  study.  In  the  Canadian  Institute  Proceedings  (1881),  vol.  i.  p.  171,  Campbell 
points  out  the  affinities  of  the  Tinneh  with  the  Tungus,  and  of  the  Choctaws  and  Cherokees  with  the  Ko- 

Note.  — Sketch  map  from  the  U.  S.  Geodetic  Survey , 1880,  App.  xvi ; also  in  Journal  Amer.  Geog.  See., 
xv.  p.  114.  Cf.  Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races , i.  35. 


78 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


passage  by  Behring’s  Straits  solved  many  of 
the  difficulties  of  the  American  problem.1 

The  problem  as  to  the  passage  by  the  Aleu- 
tian Islands  is  converted  into  the  question 
whether  primitive  people  could  have  success- 
fully crossed  an  interval  from  Asia  of  130  miles 
to  reach  the  island  Miedna,  126  more  to  Beh- 
ring’s Island,  and  then  235  to  Attu,  the  western- 
most of  the  Aleutian  Islands,  or  nearly  500  miles 
in  all,  and  to  have  crossed  in  such  numbers  as  to 
affect  the  peopling  of  the  new  continent.  There 
are  some,  like  Winchell,  who  see  no  difficulty  in 
the  case.2  There  are  no  authenticated  relics,  it 
is  believed,  to  prove  the  Tartar  occupancy  of 
the  northwest  of  America.3  That  there  have 
been  occasional  estrays  upon  the  coasts  of 
British  Columbia,  Oregon,  and  California,  by 
the  drifting  thither  of  Chinese  and  Japanese 
junks,  is  certainly  to  be  believed;  but  the  argu- 
ment against  their  crews  peopling  the  country 
is  usually  based  upon  the  probable  absence  of 
women  in  them,  — an  argument  that  certainly 
does  not  invalidate  the  belief  in  an  infusion  of 
Asiatic  blood  in  a previous  race.4 

The  easterly  passage  which  has  elicited  most 
interest  is  one  alleged  to  have  been  made  by 
some  Buddhist  priests  to  a country  called  Fu- 
sang,  and  in  proof  of  it  there  is  cited  the  narra- 


tive of  one  Hoei-Shin,  who  is  reported  to  have 
returned  to  China  in  A.  D.  499.  Beside  much 
in  the  story  that  is  ridiculous  and  impossible, 
there  are  certain  features  which  have  led  some 
commentators  to  believe  that  the  coast  of  Mex- 
ico was  intended,  and  that  the  Mexican  maguey 
plant  was  the  tree  fusang,  after  which  the 
country  is  said  to  have  been  called.  The  story 
was  first  brought  to  the  attention  of  Europeans 
in  1761,  when  De  Guignes  published  his  paper 
on  the  subject  in  the  28th  volume  (pp.  505-26) 
of  the  Academy  of  Inscriptions.5  It  seems  to 
have  attracted  little  attention  till  J.  H.  von 
Klaproth,  in  1831,  discredited  the  American 
theory  in  his  “ Recherches  sur  le  pays  de  Fou- 
sang,”  published  in  the  Nouvelles  Amiales  des 
Voyages  (2d  ser.,  vol.  xxi.),  accompanied  by  a 
chart.  In  1834  there  appeared  at  Paris  a French 
translation,  Annales  des  Empereurs  du  Japon 
( Nipon  o dai  itsi  rau),  to  which  (vol.  iv.)  Klap- 
roth appended  an  “ Aper£u  de  l’histoire  mytho- 
logique  du  Japon,”  in  which  he  returned  to  the 
subject,  and  convinced  Humboldt  at  least,6  that 
the  country  visited  was  Japan,  and  not  Mexico, 
though  he  could  but  see  striking  analogies,  as 
he  thought,  in  the  Mexican  myths  and  customs 
to  those  of  the  Chinese.7 

In  1841,  Karl  Friedrich  Neumann,  in  the  Zeit- 


riaks.  Cf.  also  Ibid.,  July,  1884.  Dali  and  Pinart  pronounce  against  any  affinity  of  tongues  in  the  Contribu- 
tions to  Amer.  Ethnology  (Washington),  i.  97.  Cf.  Short,  No.  Amer.  of  Antiq .,  494 ; Leland’s  Fusang, 
ch.  10. 

1 Behring’s  Straits,  first  opened,  as  Wallace  says,  in  quaternary  times,  are  45  miles  across,  and  are  often  frozen 
in  winter.  South  of  them  is  an  island  where  a tribe  of  Eskimos  live,  and  they  keep  constant  communication 
with  the  main  of  Asia,  50  miles  distant,  and  with  America,  120  miles  away.  Robertson  solved  the  diffi- 
culty by  this  route.  Cf.  Contributions  to  Amer.  Ethnology  (1877),  i.  95-98;  Warden’s  Recherches ; Maury, 
in  Revue  des  deux  Mondes,  Ap.  15,  1858  ; Peschel’s  Races  of  Men,  p.  401 ; F.  von  Hellwald  in  Smithsonian 
Report,  1866  ; Short,  p.  510;  Bancroft,  Native  Races,'/.  28,  29,  54;  and  Chavanne’s  Lit.  of  the  Polar  Regions, 
58,  194  — the  last  page  shows  a list  of  maps.  Max  Muller  (Chips,  ii.  270)  considers  this  theory  a postulate 
only. 

2 Contrib.  to  Amer.  Ethnology,  i.  96 ; Lyell’s  Principles  of  Geology,  8th  ed.,  368  ; A.  Ragine’s  Decouverte 
de  V Amerique  du  Kamtchatka  et  des  lies  Aleoutiennes  (St.  Petersburg,  1868,  2d  ed.) ; Pickering’s  Races  of 
Men;  Peschel’s  Races  of  Men,  397  ; Morgan’s  Systems  of  Consanguinity.  Dali  ( Tribes  of  the  North-west , 
in  Powell’s  Rocky  Mountain  Region,  1877,  p.  96)  does  not  believe  in  the  Aleutian  route. 

On  the  drifting  of  canoes  for  long  distances  see  Lyell’s  Principles  of  Geology,  nth  ed.,  ii.  472;  Col.  B. 
Kennon  in  Leland’s  Fousang;  Rev.  des  deux  Mondes,  Apr.,  1858;  Vining,  ch.  1.  Cf.  Alphonse  Pinart  s 
“ Les  Aleoutes  et  leur  origine,”  in  Mem.  de  la  Soc.  d’ Ethnographic,  session  de  1872,  p.  155. 

3 Cf.  references  in  H.  H.  Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races,  v.  54.  We  have  an  uncorroborated  story  of  a Tartar  in- 
scription being  found.  Cf.  Kalm’s  Reise,  iii.  416;  Archceologia  (London,  1787b  viii.  304. 

4 Gomara  makes  record  of  such  floating  visitors  in  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century.  Horace  Davis 
published  in  the  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.  (Apr.,  1872)  a record  of  Japanese  vessels  driven  upon  the  northwest 
coast  of  America  and  its  outlying  islands  in  a paper  “ On  the  likelihood  of  an  admixture  of  Japanese  blood  on 
our  northwest  coast.”  Cf.  A.  W.  Bradford’s  American  Antiquities  (N.  Y.,  1841) ; Whymper’s  Alaska,  250  ; 
Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races,  v.  52,  with  references ; Contributions  to  Amer.  Ethnol.,  i.  97,  238  ; De  Roquefeuil’s 
Journal  du  Voyage  autour  du  Monde  (1876-79),  etc.  It  is  shown  that  the  great  Pacific  current  naturally 
carries  floating  objects  to  the  American  coast.  Davis,  in  his  tract,  gives  a map  of  it.  Cf.  Haven,  Archceol. 
U.  S.,  p.  144  ; Bull.  Amer.  Geog.  Soc.  (1883),  xv.  p.  101,  by  Thomas  Antisell;  and  China  Review,  Mar.,  Apr., 
1888,  by  J.  Edkins. 

6 Recherches  sur  les  navigations  des  Chinois  du  elite  de  V Amerique  et  sur  quelques  peuples  situes  a Vex- 
tremite  orientate  de  I'Asie  (Paris,  1761).  It  is  translated  in  Vining,  ch.  1. 

6 Examen  Critique,  ii.  65,  and  Ansichten  der  Natur,  or  Views  of  Nature,  p.  132. 

7 Much  depends  on  the  distance  intended  by  a Chinese  li.  Klaproth  translated  the  version  as  given  by  an 


Note. — The  map  of  Buache,  1752,  showing  De  Guignes’  route  of  the  Chinese  emigration  to  Fusang. 
Reduced  from  the  copy  in  the  Congris  internationale  des  Amcricanistes,  Compte  Rendu , Nancy , r8y 5. 


8o 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


schriftfiir  allgemeine  Erdkunde  (new  series,  vol. 
xvi.),  published  a paper  on  “Ost  Asien  und 
West  Amerika  nach  Chinesischen  Quellen  aus 
dem  fiinften,  sechsten  und  siebenten  Jahrhun- 
dert,”  in  which  he  gave  a version  of  the  Hcei- 
shin  (Hoei-schin,  Hui-shen)  narrative,  which 
Chas.  G.  Leland,  considering  it  a more  perfect 
form  of  the  original  than  that  given  by  De 
Guignes,  translated  into  English  in  The  Knick- 
erbocker Mag.  (1850),  xxxvi.  301,  as  “California 
and  Mexico  in  the  fifth  century.” 1 

The  next  to  discuss  the  question,  and  in  an 
affirmative  spirit,  was  Charles  Hippolyte  de 
Paravey,  in  the  Annales  de  Philosophic  Chreti- 
enne  (Feb.,  1844),  whose  paper  was  published 
separately  as  L'  Amerique  sous  le  nom  de  pays  de 
Fou-Sang , est  elle  citee  d'es  le  ye  siecle  de  notre  Ire, 
dans  les  grandes  annales  de  la  ‘Chine,  etc.  Dis- 
cussion ou  dissertation  abregle,  oit  P affirmative  est 
prouvee  (Paris,  1844);  and  in  1847  he  published 
Nouvelles  preuves  que  le  pays  du  Fousang  est 
P Amerique? 

The  controversy  as  between  De  Guignes  and 
Klaproth  was  shared,  in  1862,  by  Gustave 
d’Eichthal,  taking  the  Frenchman’s  side,  in  the 
Revue  Archeologique  (vol.  ii. ),  and  finally  in  his 
Etudes  stir  les  origines  Bouddhiques  de  la  civili- 
sation Americaine  (Paris,  1865). 3 

In  1870,  E.  Bretschneider,  in  his  “ Fusang,  or 
who  discovered  America  ? ” in  the  Chinese  Re- 
corder and  Missionary  Journal  (Foochow,  Oct., 
1870),  contended  that  the  whole  story  was  the 
fabrication  of  a lying  priest.4 


In  1875  tl>ere  was  new  activity  in  discussing 
the  question.  Two  French  writers  of  consider- 
able repute  in  such  studies  attracted  attention : 
the  one,  Lucien  Adam,  in  the  Congres  des  Ame- 
ricanistes  at  Nancy  (Compte  Rendu,  i.  145) ; and 
the  other,  Leon  de  Rosny,  entered  the  discus- 
sions at  the  same  session  ( Ibid.  i.  p.  131).6 

The  most  conspicuous  study  for  the  English 
reader  was  Charles  Godfrey  Leland’s  Fusang,  or 
The  discovery  of  America  by  Chinese  Buddhist 
priests  in  the  fifth  century  (London,  1875).6 

The  Marquis  d’Hervey  de  Saint  Denis  pub- 
lished in  the  Actes  de  la  Soc.  d' Ethnographic 
(1869),  vol.  vi.,  and  later  in  the  Comptes  Rendus 
of  the  French  Academy  of  Inscriptions,  a Me- 
moire  sur  le  pays  connu  des  anciens  Chinois  sous 
le  nom  de  Fou-sang,  et  sur  quelqties  documents 
inedits  pour  servir  a Pidentifier,  which  was 
afterwards  published  separately  in  Paris,  1876, 
in  which  he  assented  to  the  American  theory. 
The  student  of  the  subject  ndted  hardly  go,  how- 
ever, beyond  E.  P.  Vining’s  An  inglorious  Co- 
lumbus: or,  Evidence  that  Ihvui  Shan  and  a 
party  of  Buddhist  monks  front  Afghanistan  dis- 
covered America  in  the  fifth  century  A.  D.  (New 
York,  1885),  since  the  compiler  has  made  it  a 
repository  of  all  the  essential  contributions  to 
the  question  from  De  Guignes  down.  He  gives 
the  geographical  reasons  for  believing  Fusang 
to  be  Mexico  (ch.  20),  comparing  the  original 
description  of  Fusang  with  the  early  accounts 
of  aboriginal  Mexico,  and  rehearsing  the  tradi- 
tions, as  is  claimed,  of  the  Buddhists  still  found 


early  Chinese  historian  of  the  seventh  century,  Li  Yan  Tcheou,  and  Klaproth’s  version  is  Englished  in  Ban- 
croft’s Nat.  Races,  v.  33-36.  Klaproth’s  memoir  is  also  translated  in  Vining,  ch.  3.  Some  have  more  specifi- 
cally pointed  to  Saghalien,  an  island  at  the  north  end  of  the  Japan  Sea.  Brooks  says  there  is  a district  of 
Corea  called  Fusang  ( Science , viii.  402).  Brasseur  says  the  great  Chinese  encyclopedia  describes  Fusang  as 
lying  east  of  Japan,  and  he  thinks  the  descriptions  correspond  to  the  Cibola  of  Castaneda. 

1 Again  with  a commentary  in  The  Continental  Mag.  (New  York,  vol.  i.).  Subjected  to  the  revision  of 
Neumann,  it  is  reproduced  in  Leland’s  Fusang  (Lond.,  1875).  Cf.  \ ining,  ch.  6,  who  gives  also  (ch.  10)  the 
account  in  SUan-Hai-king  as  translated  by  C.  M.  Williams  in  Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  April,  1883. 

2 The  pamphlets  are  translated  in  Vining,  ch.  4 and  5.  Paravey  held  to  the  Mexican  theory,  and  he  at 
least  convinced  Domenech  ( Seven  years'1  residence  in  the  great  deserts  of  No.  Amer.,  Lond.,  i860).  Paravey 
published  several  pamphlets  on  subjects  allied  to  this.  His  Memoirc  sur  Porigine  japonaise,  arabe  et  basque 
de  la  civilisation  des peuples  du  plateau  de  Bogota  cPapris  les  travaux  de  Humboldt  et  Sicbold  (Paris,  1835) 
is  a treatise  on  the  origin  of  the  Muyscas  or  Chibchas.  Jomard,  in  his  Les  Antiquitcs  A mericaines  au  point 
de  vue  des  progrbs  de  la  geographic  (Paris,  1S17)  in  the  Bull,  de  la  Soc.  Geog .,  had  questioned  the  Asiatic 
affiliations,  and  Paravey  replied  in  a Refutation  de  V opinion  emise  par  Jomard  que  les  peuples  de  P Amerique 
wont  jamais  cn  aucun  rapport  avec  ceux  de  I’Asie  (Paris,  1849),  originally  in  the  Annales  de  philosophic 
Chretienne  (May,  1849). 

3 Also  in  the  Rev.  Archeologique  (vols.  x.,  xi.),  and  epitomized  in  Leland.  Cf.  also  Dr.  A.  Godron  on  the 
Buddhist  mission  to  America  in  Annales  des  Voyages  (Paris,  1864),  vol.  iv.,  and  an  opposing  view  by  ^ ivien 
de  St.  Martin  in  L’Annee geographique  (1865),  iii.  p.  253,  who  was  in  turn  controverted  by  Brasseur  in  his 
Monuments  Anciens  du  Mexique. 

4 This  paper  is  reprinted  in  Leland. 

5 Cf.  also  his  Varietes  Orientates,  1872 ; and  his  “ I.’Amerique,  etait-elle  connue  des  Chinois  h l'epoque  du 
deluge  ? ” in  the  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer.  de  France,  n.  s.,  iii.  191. 

6 S.  W.  Williams,  in  the  Journal  of  the  American  Oriental  Soc.  (vol.  xi.),  in  controverting  the  views  of 
Leland,  was  inclined  to  find  Fusang  in  the  Loo-choo  Islands.  This  paper  was  printed  separately  as  Notices 
(f  Fusang  and  other  countries  lying  east  of  China  in  the  Pacific  ocean  (New  Haven,  1881 ). 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


81 


by  the  Spaniards  pervading  the  memories  of  the 
natives,  and  at  last  (ch.  37)  summarizing  all  the 
grounds  of  his  belief.1 

The  consideration  of  the  Polynesian  route  as 
a possible  avenue  for  peopling  America  involves 


the  relations  of  the  Malays  to  the  inhabitants 
of  the  Oceanic  Islands  and  the  capacity  of  early 
man  to  traverse  long  distances  by  water.2 

E.  B.  Tylor  has  pointed  out  the  Asiatic  rela- 
tions of  the  Polynesians  in  the  Journal  of  the 
Anthropological  Inst.,  xi.  401.  Pickering,  in  the 


1 A good  deal  of  labor  has  been  bestowed  to  prove  this  identity  of  Fusang  with  Mexico.  It  is  held  to  be 
found  in  the  myths  and  legends  of  the  two  people  by  Charency  in  his  Mythe  de  Votan , etude  sur  les  origines 
asiatiques  de  la  civilisation  americaine  (Alengon,  1871),  drawn  from  the  Actes  de  la  Soc.  philologique  (vol. 

ii. )  ; and  he  has  enforced  similar  views  in  the  Revue  des  questions  historiques  (vi.  283),  and  in  his  Djemschid 
et  Quetzalcohuatl.  L'histoire  legendaire  de  la  Nouvelle-Espagne  rapprochee  de  la  source  indo-europeenne 
(Alengon,  1874).  Humboldt  thought  it  strange,  considering  other  affinities,  — as  for  instance  in  the  Mexican 
calendars,  — that  he  could  find  no  Mexican  use  of  phallic  symbols;  but  Bancroft  says  they  exist.  Cf.  Native 
Races , iii.  501  ; also  see  v.  40,  232;  Brasseur’s  Quatre  Lettres , p.  202;  and  John  Campbell’s  paper  on  the 
traditions  of  Mexico  and  Peru  as  establishing  such  connections,  in  the  Compte  Rendu , Cotigres  des  Amer. 
(Nancy,  1875),  i.  348.  Dr.  Hamy  saw  in  a monument  found  at  Copan  an  inscription  which  he  thought  was 
the  Tae-kai  of  the  Chinese,  the  symbol  of  the  essence  of  all  things  {Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Geog.,  1886,  and 
Journal  of  the  Anthropological  Institute , xvi.  242,  with  a cut  of  the  stone).  Dali  controverts  this  point 
{Science,  viii.  402). 

Others  have  dwelt  on  the  linguistic  resemblances.  B.  S.  Barton  in  his  New  Views  pressed  this  side  of  the 
question.  The  presence  of  a monosyllabic  tongue  like  the  Otomi  in  the  midst  of  the  polysyllabic  languages 
of  Mexico  has  been  thought  strongly  to  indicate  a survival.  Cf.  Manuel  Najera’s  Disertacion  sobre  la  lengua 
Othonii,  Mexico,  1845,  ar>d  in  Amer.  Philos.  Soc.  Trans.,  n.  s.,v. ; Ampere’s  Promenade  cn  Amerique,  ii. 
301;  Prescott’s  Mexico,  iii.  396;  Warden’s  Recherches  (in  Dupaix),  p.  125;  Latham’s  Races  of  Men,  408 ; 
Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races,  iii.  737 ; v.  39,  with  references.  Others  find  Sanskrit  roots  in  the  Mexican.  E.  B. 
Tylor  has  indicated  the  Asiatic  origin  of  certain  Mexican  games  (Journal  of  the  Anthropol.  Inst.,  xxiv.). 
Ornaments  of  jade  found  in  Nicaragua,  while  the  stone  is  thought  to  be  native  only  in  Asia,  is  another  indica- 
tion, and  they  are  more  distinctively  Asiatic  than  the  jade  ornaments  found  in  Alaska  ( Peabody  Mus.  Re- 
ports, xviii.  414  ; xx.  548  ; Proc.  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.,  Jan.,  1886). 

On  the  general  question  of  the  Asiatic  origin  of  the  Mexicans  see  Dupaix’s  Antiquites  Mexicaines,  with 
included  papers  by  Lenoir,  Warden,  and  Farcy  ; the  Report  on  a railroad  route  from  the  Mississippi,  1853-54 
(Washington);  Whipple’s  and  other  Reports  on  the  Indian  tribes  ; John  Russell  Bartlett’s  Personal  Narra- 
tive (1854);  Brasseur’s  Popttl  Vuh,  p.  xxxix ; Viollet  le  Due’s  belief  in  a “yellow  race”  building  the 
Mexican  and  Central  American  monuments,  in  Charnay’s  Ruines  Americaines,  and  Charnay’s  traces  of  the 
Buddhists  in  the  Popular  Science  Monthly,  July,  1S79,  P-  432  > Be  Plongeon’s  belief  in  the  connection  of  the 
Maya  and  Asiatic  races  in  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  Apr.  30,  1879,  P-  1 1 3 ; and  some  papers  on  the  ancient 
Mexicans  and  their  origin  by  the  Abbe  Jolibois,  Col.  Parmentier,  and  M.  Emile  Guimet,  which,  prepared  for 
the  Soc.  de  Geog.  de  Lyon,  were  published  separately  as  Dc  Vorigine  des  Anciens  Peuples  du  Mexique 
(Lyon,  1875). 

A few  other  incidental  discussions  of  the  Fusang  question  are  these : R.  H.  Major  in  Select  Letters  of 
Columbzis  (1847)  ; J.  T.  Short  in  The  Galaxy  (1875)  and  in  his  No.  Americans  of  Antiquity,  Nadaillac  in 
his  L'  Amerique prehistorique,  544  ; Gay’s  Pop.  Hist.  U.  S.  calls  the  story  vague  and  improbable.  In  periodicals 
we  find-  Gentleman's  Mag.,  1869,  p.  333  (reprinted  in  Hist.  Mag.,  Sept.,  1869,  xvi.  221),  and  1870,  repro- 
duced in  Chinese  Recorder,  May,  1870;  Nathan  Brown  in  Amer.  Philolog.  Mag.,  Aug.,  1869;  Wm.  Speer  in 
Princeton  Rev.,  xxv.  83;  Penn  Monthly,  vi.  603;  Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  Apr.,  1S83,  p.  291  ; Notes  and  Queries, 

iii.  58,  78;  iv.  19;  Notes  and  Queries  in  China  and  Japan,  Apr.,  May,  1869;  Feb.,  1870.  Chas.  W.  Brooks 
maintained  on  the  other  hand  (Proc.  California  Acad.  Sciences,  1876;  cf.  Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  v.  51), 
that  the  Chinese  were  emigrants  from  America.  There  is  a map  of  the  supposed  Chinese  route  to  America  in 
the  Congrls  des  Americanistcs  (Nancy,  1875),  vol.  '•  i and  Winchell,  Pre-Adamites,  gives  a chart  showing 
different  lines  of  approach  from  Asia.  Stephen  Powers  ( Overland  Monthly,  Apr.,  1872,  and  California 
Acad.  Sciences,  1875)  treats  the  California  Indians  as  descendants  of  the  Chinese,  — a view  he  modifies  in  the 
Contrib.  to  Amer.  Ethnology,  vol.  iii.,  on  “Tribes  of  California.”  It  is  claimed  that  Chinese  coin  of  the 
fifteenth  century  have  been  found  in  mounds  on  Vancouver’s  Island.  Cf.  G.  P.  Thurston  in  Mag.  Amer.  Hist., 
xiii.  p.  457.  The  principal  lists  of  authorities  are  those  in  Vining  (app.),  and  Watson’s  in  Anderson’s  Amer- 
ica not  discovered  by  Columbus . 

2 From  Easter  Island  to  the  Galapagos  is  2,000  miles,  thence  to  South  America  600  more.  On  such  long 
migrations  by  water  see  Waitz,  Introduction  to  Anthropology,  Eng.  transl.,  p.  202.  On  early  modes  of 
navigation  see  Col.  A.  Lane  Fox  in  Mae.  Journal  Anthropological  Inst.  (1875),  iv.  399.  Otto  Caspari  gives  a 
map  of  post-tertiary  times  in  his  Urgeschichte  der  Menschheit  (Leipzig,  1873),  vol.  i.,  in  which  land  is  made 
tp  stretch  from  the  Marquesas  Islands  nearly  to  South  America;  while  large  patches  of  land  lie  between  Asia 
and  Mexico,  to  render  migration  practicable.  Andrew  Murray,  in  his  Geographical  Distribution  of  Mammals 

VOL.  1.  — 6 


82 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


ethnological  chart  accompanying  the  reports  of 
the  Wilkes  Expedition,  makes  the  original  people 
of  Chili  and  Peru  to  be  Malay,  and  he  connects 
the  Californians  with  the  Polynesians.1 

The  earliest  elaboration  of  this  theory  was  in 
John  Dunmore  Lang’s  View  of  the  origin  and 
■migrations  of  the  Polynesian  nations,  demonstrat- 
ing their  ancient  discovery  and  progressive  set- 
tlement of  the  continent  of  America  (London, 
1834;  2d  ed.,  Sydney,  1877).  Francis  A.  Allen 
has  advanced  similar  views  at  the  meetings  of 
the  Congres  des  Americanistes  at  Luxembourg 
and  at  Copenhagen.2 

The  Mongol  theory  of  the  occupation  of  Peru, 
which  John  Ranking  so  enthusiastically  pressed 
in  his  Historical  researches  on  the  conquest  of 
Peru , Mexico , Bogota,  Natchez,  and  Talomeco,  in 
the  thirteenth  century,  by  the  Mongols,  accom- 
panied with  elephants ; and  the  local  agreement 
of  history  and  tradition,  with  the  remains  of 
elephants  and  mastodontes  found  in  the  new 
world  [etc.]  (London,  1827),  implies  that  in  the 
thirteenth  century  the  Mongol  emperor  Kublai 
Khan  sent  a fleet  against  Japan,  which,  being 
scattered  in  a storm,  finally  in  part  reached  the 
coasts  of  Peru,  where  the  son  of  Kublai  Khan 


became  the  first  Inca.3  The  book  hardly  takes 
rank  as  a sensible  contribution  to  ethnology, 
and  Prescott  says  of  it  that  it  embodies  “ many 
curious  details  of  Oriental  history  and  manners 
in  support  of  a whimsical  theory.”  4 

B.  Ireland  the  Great,  or  White  Man’s 
Land.  — The  claims  of  the  Irish  to  have  pre- 
ceded the  Norse  in  Iceland,  and  to  have  discov- 
ered America,  rest  on  an  Icelandic  saga,  which 
represents  that  in  the  tenth  century  Are  Marson, 
driven  off  his  course  by  a gale,  found  a land 
which  became  known  as  Huitramannaland,  or 
white  man’s  land,  or  otherwise  as  Irland  it  Mi- 
kla.6  This  region  was  supposed  by  the  colonists 
of  Vinland  to  lie  farther  south,  which  Rafn  6 in- 
terprets as  being  along  the  Carolina  coast,7  and 
others  have  put  it  elsewhere,  as  Beauvois  in 
Canada  above  the  Great  Lakes ; and  still  others 
see  no  more  in  it  than  the  pressing  of  some 
storm-driven  vessel  to  the  Azores 8 or  some 
other  Atlantic  island.  The  story  is  also  coupled, 
from  another  source,  with  the  romance  of  Bjarni 
Asbrandson,  who  sailed  away  from  Iceland  and 
from  a woman  he  loved,  because  the  husband 
and  relatives  of  the  woman  made  it  desirable  that 


(London,  1866),  is  almost  compelled  to  admit  (p.  2;)  that  as  complete  a circuit  of  land  formerly  crossed  the 
southern  temperate  regions  as  now  does  the  northern  ; and  Daniel  Wilson,  Prehistoric  Man,  holds  much  the 
same  opinion.  The  connection  of  the  flora  of  Polynesia  and  South  America  is  discussed  by  J.  D.  Hooker  in 
the  Botany  of  the  Antarctic  Voyage  of  the  Erebus  and  Terror,  1839-43,  and  in  his  Flora  of  Tasmania. 
Cf.  Amer.  Journal  of  Science  and  Arts,  Mar.,  May,  1854  ; Jan.,  May,  i860. 

1 Races  of  Men. 

2 Compte  Rendu,  1877,  p.  79;  1883,  p.  246;  the  latter  being  called  “Polynesian  Antiquities,  a link  be- 
tween the  ancient  civilizations  of  Asia  and  America.”  Further  discussions  of  the  Polynesian  migrations  will 
be  found  as  follows:  A.  W.  Bradford’s  Amer.  Antiquities  (N.  Y.,  1841)  ; Gallatin  {Am.  Eth.  Soc.  Trans.,  i. 
176)  disputed  any  common  linguistic  traces,  while  Bradford  thought  he  found  such  ; Lesson  and  Martinet’s 
Les  Polynesiens,  leur  origine,  leurs  migrations,  leur  langage ; Wilson’s  Prehistoric  Man , ii.  344 ; J ules 
Garnier’s  “Les  migrations  polynesiennes ” in  Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Geog.  de  Paris,  Jan.,  June,  1870;  G. 
d’Eichthal’s  “ Etudes  sur  l’histoire  primitive  des  races  oceaniennes  et  Americaines  ” in  Mem.  de  la  Soc.  E*h- 
nologique  (vol.  ii.) ; Marcoy’s  Travels  in  South  America;  C.  Staniland  Wake’s  Chapters  on  Man,  p.  200; 
a “ Rapport  de  la  Polynesie  et  l’Amerique  ” in  the  Memoires  de  la  Soc.  Ethnologique,  ii.  223 ; A.  de  Quatre- 
fages  de  Breau’s  Les  Polynesiens  et  leurs  migrations  (Paris,  1866),  from  the  Revue  des  deux  Mondes,  Feb., 
1864 ; O.  F.  Peschel  in  Ausland,  1864,  p.  348  ; W.  II.  Dali  .in  Bureau  of  Ethnology  Rept.,  1881-82,  p.  147. 
Allen’s  paper,  already  referred  to,  gives  references. 

3 Bancroft,  Nat.  Races,  v.  44,  with  references,  p.  48,  epitomizes  the  story.  Cf.  Short,  15 1.  There  was  a 
tradition  of  giants  landing  on  the  shore  (Markham’s  Cieza  de  Leon,  p.  190).  Cf.  Forster’s  Voyages,  43. 

4 A belief  in  the  Asiatic  connection  has  taken  some  curious  forms.  Montesinos  in  his  Memorias  Peruanas 
held  Peru  to  be  the  Ophir  of  Solomon.  Cf.  Gotfriedus  Wegner’s  De  Navigationis  Solomonceis  (Frankfort, 
1689).  Horn  held  Hayti  to  be  Ophir,  and  he  indulges  in  some  fantastic  evidences  to  show  that  the  Iroquois, 
i.  e.  Yrcas,  were  Turks ! Cf.  Onffroy  de  Thoron  in  Le  Globe,  1869.  C.  Wiener  in  his  L' Empire  des  Incas 
(ch.  2,  4)  finds  traces  of  Buddhism,  and  so  does  Hyde  Clarke  in  his  Khita-Peruvian  Epoch  (1877).  Lopez 
has  written  on  Les  Races  Aryenncs  de  Perou  (1871).  Cf.  Robert  Ellis,  Peruvia  Scythica.  The  Quicha 
Language  of  Peru,  its  derivation  from  Central  Asia  with  the  American  languages  in  general  (London, 
1875).  Grotius  held  that  the  Peruvians  were  of  Chinese  stock.  Charles  Pickering’s  ethnological  map  gives  a 
Malay  origin  to  the  islands  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  and  a part  of  the  Pacific  coast,  the  rest  being  Mongolian. 

5 The  story  is  given  in  English  by  De  Costa  {Pre-Columbian  Disc,  of  America,  p.  85)  from  the  Landnama- 
b&k,  no.  107.  Cf.  Saga  of  Thorfinn  Karlsefne,  ch.  13,  and  that  of  Erik  the  Red.  Leif  is  said  in  the  sagas 
to  have  met  shipwrecked  white  people  on  the  coasts  visited  by  him  {Hist.  Mag.,  xiii.  46). 

6 Antiquitates  Americans,  162, 183,  205,  210,  211,  212,  214,  319,  446-51. 

7 Brinton  in  Hist.  Mag.,  ix.  364 ; Rivero  and  Tschudi’s  Peru. 

3 Schoning’s  Heimskringla.  Gronlands  Historishe  Mindesmsrker,  i.  150. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS.  8 $ 


he  should.  Thirty  years  later,  the  crew  of  an- 
other ship,  wrecked  on  a distant  coast,1  found 
that  the  people  who  took  them  prisoners  spoke 
Irish,2  and  that  their  chieftain  was  this  same  ren- 
egade, who  let  them  go  apparently  for  the  pur- 
pose of  conveying  some  token  by  which  he  would 
be  remembered  to  the  Thurid  of  his  dreams.  Of 
course  all  theorists  who  have  to  deal  with  these 
supposed  early  discoveries  by  Europeans  con- 
nect, each  with  his  own  pet  scheme,  the  prevail- 
ing legendary  belief  among  the  American  Indi- 
ans that  white  men  at  an  early  period  made 
their  appearance  on  the  coasts  all  the  way  from 
Central  America  to  Labrador.8  Whether  these 
strange  comers  be  St.  Patrick,4  St.  Brandan 
even,  or  some  other  Hibernian  hero,  with  his 


followers,  is  easily  to  be  adduced,  if  the  dispos- 
ing mind  is  inclined. 

There  have  been  of  late  years  two  considera- 
ble attempts  to  establish  the  historical  verity  of 
some  of  these  alleged  Irish  visits.5 

C.  The  Norse  in  Iceland. — The  chief 
original  source  for  the  Norse  settlement  of  Icfe- 
land  is  the  famous  Landnamabok ,6  which  is  a 
record  by  various  writers,  at  different  times,  of 
the  partitioning  and  ownership  of  lands  during 
the  earliest  years  of  occupation.7  This  and 
other  contemporary  manuscripts,  including  the 
Heimskrmgla  of  Snorre  Sturleson  and  the  great 
body  of  Icelandic  sagas,  either  at  first  hand  or 
as  filtered  through  the  leading  writers  on  Ice- 


1 Eyrbyggja  Saga , ch.  64,  and  given  in  English  in  De  Costa’s  Pre-Columbian  Discovery , p.  89.  Cf.  Sir 
Walter  Scott’s  version  of  this  saga  and  the  appendix  of  Mallet’s  Northern  Antiquities. 

2 Traces  of  Celtic  have  been  discovered  by  some  of  the  philologists,  when  put  to  the  task,  in  the  American 
languages.  Cf.  Humboldt,  Relation  Historique , iii.  159.  Lord  Monboddo  held  such  a theory. 

3 Brinton’s  Myths  of  the  New  World,  176.  One  of  the  earliest  accounts  which  we  have  of  the  Cherokees 
is  that  by  Henry  Timberlake  (London,  1765),  and  he  remarks  on  their  lighter  complexion  as  indicating  a pos- 
sible descent  from  these  traditionary  white  men. 

4 Richard  Broughton’s  Monasticon  Britannicum  (London,  1655),  pp.  131,  187. 

6 A Memoir  on  the  European  Colonization  of  America  in  ante-historic  times  was  contributed  to  the  Pro- 
ceedings of  the  American  Ethnological  Society  in  1851,  to  which  E.  G.  Squier  added  some  notes,  the  original 
paper  being  by  Dr.  C.  A.  A.  Zestermann  of  Leipzig.  The  aim  was  to  prove,  by  the  similarity  of  remains,  the 
connection  of  the  peoples  who  built  the  mounds  of  the  Ohio  Valley  with  the  early  peoples  of  northwestern 
Europe,  a Caucasian  race,  which  he  would  identify  with  the  settlers  of  Irland  it  Mikla,  and  with  the  coming 
of  the  white-bearded  men  spoken  of  in  Mexican  traditions,  who  established  a civilization  which  an  inundating 
population  from  Asia  subsequently  buried  from  sight.  This  European  immigration  he  places  at  least  1,200 
years  before  Christ.  Squier’s  comments  are  that  the  monumental  resemblances  referred  to  indicate  similar 
conditions  of  life  rather  than  ethnic  connections. 

The  other  advocate  was  Eugene  Beauvois  in  a paper  published  in  the  Compte  Rendu  du  Congrls  des 
Amcricanistcs  (Nancy,  1875,  P-  4)  as  dccouverte  du  nouveau  monde par  les  irlandais  ct  les premibres 
traces  du  christianisme  en  Amerique  avant  Van  1000,  accompanied  by  a map,  in  which  he  makes  Irland  it 
Mikla  correspond  to  the  provinces  of  Ontario  and  Quebec.  Again, .in  the  session  at  Luxembourg  in  1877,  he 
endeavored  to  connect  the  Irish  colony  with  the  narrative  of  the  seaman  in  the  Zeno  accounts,  in  a paper  which 
he  called  Les  Colonies  Europeennes  du  Markland  et  de  VEscociland  au  xiv.  Sibcle,  et  les  vestiges  qui  en 
subsistbrent  jusqu' aux  xvie  et  xviie  Sibcles,  and  in  which  he  identifies  the  Estotiland  of  the  Frislanda 
mariner.  M.  Beauvois  again,  at  the  Copenhagen  meeting  of  the  same  body,  read  a paper  on  Les  Relations 
precolumbiennes  des  Gaels  avec  le  Mcxique  (Copenhagen,  1883,  p.  74),  in  which  he  elicited  objections  from 
M.  Lucien  Adam.  Beauvois  belongs  to  that  class  of  enthusiasts  somewhat  numerous  in  these  studies  of  pre- 
Columbian  discoveries,  who  have  haunted  these  Congresses  cf  Americanists,  and  who  see  overmuch.  Other 
references  to  these  Irish  claims  are  to  be  found  in  Laing’s  Heimskringla , i.  186;  Beamish’s  Discovery  of 
America  (London,  1841) ; Gravier’s  Dccouverte  de  l' Amerique,  p.  123,  137,  and  his  Les  Normands  sur  la 
route,  etc.,  ch.  1 ; Gaffarel’s  Etudes  sur  la  rapports  de  V Amerique,  pp.  201,  214  ; Brasseur’s  introd.  to  his 
Popul  Vuh  ; De  Costa’s  Pre-Colmnbian  Discovery,  pp. 'xviii,  xlix,  lii ; Humboldt’s  Cosmos  (Bohn),  ii.  607 ; 
Rask  in  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  xviii.  21  ; Journal  London  Gcog.  Soc.,  viii.  125  ; Gay’s  Pop.  Hist.  U.  S.,  i.  53  ; 
and  K.  Wilhelmi’s  Island,  Hvitramannaland , Gronland  u?id  Vinland,  Oder  Der  Norrmanncr  Lcben  a7tf 
Island  und  Gronland  und  deren  Fahrten  nach  Amcrtka  schon  iiber  500  Jahre  vor  Columbus  (Heidelberg, 
1842). 

6 The  account  in  the  LandnUmabdk  is  briefly  rehearsed  in  ch.  S of  C.  W.  Paijkull's  Summer  in  Iceland 
(London,  1868). 

7 There  are  various  editions,  of  which  the  best  is  called  that  of  Copenhagen,  1843.  The  Islendingabbk,  a 
sort  of  epitome  of  a lost  historical  narrative,  is  considered  an  introduction  to  the  Landnamabok.  Much  of 
the  early  story  will  be  found  in  Latin  in  the  Islenzkir  Ann&ler , sive  Annales  Islandici  ab  anno  Christi  803 
ad  anno  1430  (Copenhagen,  1847) ; in  the  Scripta  historica  Islandorum  de  rebus  veterum  Borealiuni,  pub- 
lished by  the  Royal  Soc.  of  Northern  Antiquaries  at  Copenhagen,  1S2S-46;  and  in  Jacobus  Langebek’s  Scrip- 
tores  Rerum  Danicarum  medii  cevi  (Copenhagen,  1772-1S78,  — the  ninth  volume  being  a recently  added 
index). 


84 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


landic  history,  constitute  the  material  out  of 
which  is  made  up  the  history  of  Iceland,  in  the 
days  when  it  was  sending  its  adventurous  spirits 
to  Greenland  and  probably  to  the  American 
main.1 

Respecting  the  body  of  the  sagas,  Laing 
{Heimskringla,  i.  23)  says:  “It  does  not  ap- 
pear that  any  saga  manuscript  now  existing  has 
been  written  before  fhe  fourteenth  century,  how- 
ever old  the  saga  itself  may  be.  It  is  known 
that  in  the  twelfth  century,  Are  Frode,  Saemund 
and  others  began  to  take  the  sagas  out  of  the 
traditionary  state  and  fix  them  in  writing ; but 
none  of  the  original  skins  appear  to  have  come 
down  to  our  time,  but  only  some  of  the  numer- 
ous copies  of  them.”  Laing  (p.  24)  also  in- 
stances numerous  sagas  known  to  have  existed, 
but  they  are  not  now  recognized  ; 2 and  he  gives 
us  (p.  30)  the  substance  of  what  is  known  re- 
specting the  writers  and  transcribers  of  this  early 
saga  literature.  It  is  held  that  by  the  beginning 
of  the  thirteenth  century  the  sagas  of  the  discov- 
eries and  settlements  had  all  been  put  in  writing, 
and  thus  the  history,  as  it  exists,  of  mediaeval 
Iceland  is,  as  Burton  says  ( Ultima  Thule,  \.  237), 
more  complete  than  that  of  any  European  coun- 
try.3 

Among  the  secondary  writers,  using  either  at 
first  or  second  hand  the  early  M S.  sources,  the 
following  may  be  mentioned  : — 

One  of  the  earliest  brought  to  the  attention  of 
the  English  public  was  A Compendious  Hist,  of  the 


Goths , Swedes  and  Vandals,  and  other  northern 
powers  (London,  1650  and  1658),  translated  in  an 
abridged  form  from  the  Latin  of  Olaus  Magnus, 
which  had  been  for  more  than  a hundred  years 
the  leading  comprehensive  authority  on  the 
northern  nations.  The  Sveamkes  Historia  (Stock- 
holm, 1746-62)  of  Olof  von  Dalin  and  the  sim- 
ilar work  of  Sven  Lagerbring  (1769-1788),  cov- 
ering the  early  history  of  the  north,  are  of  inter- 
est for  the  comparative  study  of  the  north,  rather 
than  as  elucidating  the  history  of  Iceland  in 
particular.4  More  direct  aid  will  be  got  from 
Mallet’s  Northern  Antiquities  (London  edition, 
1847)  and  from  Wheaton’s  Northmen.  More 
special  is  the  Histoire  de  P Island  of  Xavier 
Marmier  ; and  the  German  historian  F.  C.  Dahl- 
man  also  touches  Iceland  with  particular  atten- 
tion in  his  Geschichte  von  Dane  mark  bis  zur 
Reformation,  mit  Inbegriff  von  Norwegen  und 
Island  (Hamburg,  1840-43). 

A history  of  more  importance  than  any  other 
yet  published,  and  of  the  widest  scope,  was  that 
of  Sweden  by  E.  J.  Geijer  (continued  by  F.  F. 
Carlson),  which  for  the  early  period  (down  to 
1654)  is  accessible  in  English  in  a translation  by 
J.  H.  Turner  (London,  1845).5 

Prominent  among  the  later  school  of  north- 
ern historians,  all  touching  the  Icelandic  annals 
more  or  less,  have  been  Peter  Andreas  Munch 
in  his  Det  Norske  Folks  Ilistorie  (Christiania, 
1852-63); 6 N.  M.  Petersen  in  his  Danmarks 
Historic  i Hedenold  (Copenhagen,  1854-55);  K. 


1 A convenient  survey  of  this  early  literature  is  in  chapter  1 of  the  History  of  the  Literature  of  the  Scan- 
dinavian North,  from  the  most  ancient  times  to  the  present,  by  Frederick  IVinkel  Horn,  revised  by  the 
author,  and  translated  by  Rasmus  B.  Anderson  (Chicago,  1884).  The  text  is  accompanied  by  useful  biblio- 
graphical details.  Cf.  B.  F.  De  Costa  in  Journal  Amer.  Geog.  Soc.  (1880),  xii.  159. 

2 Saxo  Grammaticus  acknowledges  his  dependence  on  the  Icelandic  sagas,  and  is  thought  to  have  used  some 
which  had  not  been  yet  put  into  writing. 

3 Baring-Gould  in  his  Iceland,  its  Scenes  and  Sagas  (London,  1863)  gives  in  his  App.  D a list  of  thirty- 
five  published  sagas,  sixty-six  local  histories,  twelve  ecclesiastical  annals,  and  sixty-nine  Norse  annals.  Cf. 
the  eclectic  list  in  Laing’s  Heimskringla,  i.  17. 

Konrad  Maurer  has  given  an  elaborate  essay  on  this  early  literature  in  his  Ueber  die  Ausdriicke : altnordi- 
sche,  altnorwcgische  und  isldndische  Sprache  (Munich,  1867),  which  originally  appeared  in  the  Abhandlungen 
of  the  Bavarian  Academy. 

G.  P.  Marsh  translated  P.  E.  Miiller’s  “Origin,  progress,  and  decline  of  Icelandic  historical  literature”  in 
The  American  Eclectic  (N.  Y.,  1841,  — vols.  i.,  ii.).  In  17S1,  Lindblom  printed  at  Paris  a French  translation 
of  Bishop  Troil’s  Lettres  sur  VIslande,  which  contained  a catalogue  of  books  on  Iceland  and  an  enumeration 
of  the  Icelandic  sagas.  (Cf.  Pinkerton’s  Voyages,  vol.  i.)  Chavanne’s  Bibliography  of  the  Polar  Regions, 
p.  95,  has  a section  on  Iceland. 

Solberg’s  list  of  illustrative  works,  appended  to  Anderson’s  version  of  Horn’s  Lit.  of  the  Scandinavian 
North,  is  useful  so  far  as  the  English  language  goes.  Periodical  contributions  also  appear  in  Poole's  Index 
(p.  622)  and  Supplement , p.  214. 

Burton  ( Ultima  Thule,  i.  239)  enumerates  the  principal  writers  on  Iceland  from  Arngrimur  Jdnsson  down, 
including  the  travellers  of  this  century. 

4 The  more  general  histories  of  Scandinavia,  like  Sinding’s  English  narrative,  — not  a good  book,  but 

accessible,  — yield  the  comparisons  more  readily. 

6 There  are  also  German  (Gotha,  1844-75)  and  French  versions  (Paris).  The  best  German  version,  Ge- 
schichte Schwedens  (Hamburg  and  Gotha,  1S32-18S7),  is  in  six  volumes,  a part  of  the  Geschichte  dcr  euro- 
paischen  Staaten.  Vol.  t —3,  by  E.  G.  Geijer,  is  translated  by  O.  P.  Leffler ; vol.  4,  by  F.  F.  Carlson,  is  trans- 
lated by  J.  G.  Petersen  ; vol.  5,  6,  by  F.  F.  Carlson. 

6 Published  in  German  at  Liibeck  in  1854  as  Das  heroische  Zeitalter  der  Nordisch-Germanischen  Vblkc r 
und  die  Wikinger-Ziige. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


55 


Keyser  in  his  Norges  Historic  (Christiania,  1866- 
67)  ; J.  E.  Sars  in  his  Udsigt  over  den  Norske 
Historic  (Christiania,  1873-77);  but  all  are  sur- 
passed by  Konrad  Maurer’s  Island  von  seiner 
ersten  Entdeckung  bis  zum  Untergange  des  Frei- 
staates,  — a.  d.  800-1262  (Munich,  1874),  pub- 
lished as  commemorating  the  thousandth  anni- 
versary of  the  settlement  of  Iceland,  and  it  has 
the  repute  of  being  the  best  book  on  early  Ice- 
landic history.1 

The  change  from  Paganism  to  Christianity 
necessarily  enters  into  all  the  histories  covering 
the  tenth  and  eleventh  centuries ; but  it  has 
special  treatment  in  C.  Merivale’s  Conversion  of 
the  Northern  Nations  (Boyle  lectures,  — London, 
1866).2 

There  is  a considerable  body  of  the  later  liter- 
ature upon  Iceland,  retrospective  in  character, 
and  affording  the  results  of  study  more  or  less 


patient  as  to  the  life  in  the  early  Norse  days  in 
Iceland.8 

G.  W.  Dasent’s  introduction  to  his  Story  of 
Burnt  Njal  (Edinburgh,  1861) 4 and  his  Norse- 
men in  Iceland  (Oxford  Essays,  1858)  give  what 
Max  Muller  ( Chips  from  a German  Workshop, 
ii.  191)  calls  “a  vigorous  and  lively  sketch  of 
primitive  northern  life ; ” and  are  well  supple- 
mented by  Sabine  Baring-Gould’s  Iceland,  its 
see  ties  and  sagas  (London,  1863  and  later),  and 
Richard  F.  Burton’s  Ultima  Thule,  with  an  his- 
torical introduction  (London,  1875).5 

D.  Greenland  and  its  Ruins.  — The  sagas 
still  serve  us  for  the  colonization  of  Greenland, 
and  of  particular  use  is  that  of  Eric  the  Red.6 
The  earliest  to  use  these  sources  in  the  historic 
spirit  was  Torfaeus  in  his  Historia  Gronlandice 
Antiques  (1715).7  The  natural  successor  of 


1 Maurer  had  long  been  a student  of  Icelandic  lore,  and  his  Isldndische  Volkssagen  der  Gegenwart  gesain- 
melt  utld  verdeutscht  (Leipzig,  i860)  is  greatly  illustrative  of  the  early  north.  Conybeare  ( Place  of  Iceland 
in  the  History  of  European  Institutions,  preface)  says  : “ To  any  one  writing  on  Iceland  the  elaborate  works 
of  the  learned  Maurer  afford  at  once  a help  and  difficulty:  a help  in  so  far  as  they  shed  the  fullest  light 
upon  the  subjects ; a difficulty  in  that  their  painstaking  completeness  has  brought  together  well-nigh  every- 
thing that  can  be  said.” 

2 What  is  known  as  the  Kristni  Saga  gives  an  account  of  this  change.  Cf.  Eugene  Beauvois,  Origines  et 
fondation  du  plus  ancien  ev&ch'c  du  nouveau  monde.  Le  diocise  de  Gardhs  en  Greenland,  q8b-mb 
(Paris,  1878),  an  extract  from  the  Memoires  de  la  Soc.  d’ Histoirc,  etc.,  de  Beaune;  C.  A.  V.  Conybeare’s 
Place  of  Iceland  in  the  history  of  European  institutions  (1877);  Maurer’s  Beitrage  zur  Rcchtsgeschichte 
des  gcrmanischcn  Nordcns  ; Wheaton’s  Northmen  ; Worsaae’s  Danes  and  Norwegians  in  England,  p.  332  ; 
Jacob  Rudolph  Keyser’s  Private  Life  of  the  Old  Northmen,  as  translated  by  M.  R.  Barnard  (London,  1S68), 
and  his  Religion  of  the  Northmen,  as  translated  by  B.  Pennock  (N.  Y.,  1854);  Quarterly  Review,  January, 
1862  ; and  references  in  McClintock  and  Strong’s  Cyclopadia,  under  Iceland. 

3 Such  are  the  Swedish  work  of  A.  M.  Strinhold,  known  in  the  German  of  E.  F.  Frisch  as  Wikingziige, 
Staatsvcrfassung  und  Sittcn  der  alien  Scandinavcr  (Hamburg,  1839-41). 

A summarized  statement  of  life  in  Iceland  in  the  early  days  is  held  to  be  well  made  out  in  Hans  O.  H. 
Hildebrand’s  Lifvct  pd  Island  under  Sagotiden  (Stockholm,  1867),  and  in  A.  E.  Holmberg’s  Nordbon  under 
Hednaiiden  (Stockholm).  J.  A.  Worsaae  published  his  Vorgcschichte  des  Hardens  at  Hamburg  in  1S78. 
It  was  improved  in  a Danish  edition  in  1880,  and  from  this  H.  F.  Morland  Simpson  made  the  Prehistory  of 
the  North,  based  on  contemporary  materials  (London,  1S86),  with  a memoir  of  Worsaae  (d.  1885),  the  fore- 
most scholar  in  this  northern  lore. 

4 This  book  is  recognized  as  one  of  the  best  commentaries  and  most  informing  books  on  Icelandic  history, 
and  this  writer’s  introduction  to  Gudbrand  Vigfusson’s  Icelandic-English  Dictionary  (3  vols.,  Cambridge, 
Eng.,  1869,  1870,  1874)  is  of  scholarly  importance. 

6 The  millennial  celebration  of  the  settlement  of  Iceland  in  1874  gave  occasion  to  a variety  of  books  and 
papers,  more  or  less  suggestive  of  the  early  days,  like  Samuel  Kneeland’s  American  in  Iceland  (Boston. 
1876) ; but  the  enumeration  of  this  essentially  descriptive  literature  need  not  be  undertaken  here. 

6 Antiquitates  Americana:,  pp.  1-76,  with  an  account  of  the  Greenbnd  MSS.  (p.  255).  Muller’s ' Sagen- 
bibliothck.  Arngrimur  Jdnsson’s  Gronlandia  (Iceland,  1688).  A fac-simile  of  the  title  is  in  the  Carter-Brown 
Catalogue , ii.,  no.  1356.  A translation  by  Rev.  J.  Sephton  is  in  the  Proc.  Lit.  and  Philos.  Soc.  of  Liverpool, 
vol.  xxxiv.  183,  and  separately,  Liverpool,  1880.  There  is  a paper  in  the  Jahresbcricht  der  geographischen 
Gescllschaft  in  Miinchcn  fiir  1885  (Munich,  1886),  p.  71,  by  Oskar  Brenner,  on  “Gronland  im  Mittelalter 
nach  einer  altnorwegischen  Quelle.” 

Some  of  the  earliest  references  are  : Christopherson  Claus’  Den  Grolandske  Chronica  (Copenhagen,  1608), 
noticed  in  the  Carter-Brown  Catalogue,  ii.,  no.  64.  Gerald  de  Veer’s  True  and  perfect  description  of  three 
voyages  speaks  in  its  title  ( Carter-Brown , ii.  38)  of  “ the  countrie  lying  under  80  degrees,  which  is  thought  to 
be  Greenland,  where  never  man  had  been  before.”  Antoine  de  la  Sale  wrote  between  143S  and  1447  a curious 
book,  printed  in  1527  as  La  Salade,  in  which  he  refers  to  Iceland  and  Greenland  (Gronnellont),  where  white 
bears  abound  (Harrisse,  Bib.  Am.  Vet.,  no.  140). 

7 This  book  is  now  rare.  Dufosse  prices  it  at  50  francs ; F.  S.  Ellis,  London,  1884,  at  £5.5.0.  Before 
Torfmus,  probably  the  best  known  book  was  Isaac  de  la  Peyrfere’s  Relation  du  Groenland  (Paris,  1647).  It 


86 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Torfasus  and  the  book  upon  which  later  writers 
mostly  depend  is  David  Crantz’s  Historie  von 
Gronland,  enthaltend  die  Beschreibung  des  Landes 
und  der  Eitvwohner,  insbesonders  die  Geschichten 
der  dortigen  Mission.  Nebst  Fortsetzung  ( Barby, 
1765-70,  3 vols.).  An  English  translation  ap- 
peared in  London  in  1767,  and  again,  though  in 
an  abridged  form  with  some  changes,  in  1820. 1 

Crantz  says  of  his  own  historic  aims,  referring 
to  Torfaeus  and  to  the  accounts  given  by  the 
Eskimos  of  the  east  coast,  that  he  has  tried  to 
investigate  “ where  the  savage  inhabitants  came 
from,  and  how  the  ancient  Norwegian  inhabi- 
tants came  to  be  so  totally  extirpated,”  while  at 
the  same  time  he  looks  upon  the  history  of  the 
Moravian  missions  as  his  chiefest  theme. 

The  principal  source  for  the  identification  of 
the  ruins  of  Greenland  is  the  work  compiled  by 


Rafn  and  Finn  Magnusen,  Gronlands  Historiske 
Mindesmcerker ,2  with  original  texts  and  Danish 
versions.  Useful  summaries  and  observations 
will  be  found  in  the  paper  by  K.  Steenstrup  on 
“ Old  Scandinavian  ruins  in  South  Greenland  ” 
in  the  Comptc  Rendu,  Congrbs  des  Americanistes 
(Copenhagen,  1883,  p.  108),  and  in  one  on  “ Les 
Voyages  des  Danois  au  Greenland  ” in  the  same 
(p.  196).  Steenstrup’s  paper  is  accompanied  by 
photographs  and  cuts,  and  a map  marking  the 
site  of  the  ruins.  The  latest  account  of  them 
is  by  Lieut.  Holm  in  the  Meddelelser  om  Gron- 
land (Copenhagen,  1883),  vol.  vi.  Other  views 
and  plans  showing  the  arrangement  of  their 
dwellings  and  the  curious  circular  ruins,3  which 
seems  to  have  usually  been  near  their  churches, 
are  shown  in  the  Baron  Nordenskjold’s  Den 
andra  dicksonska  expeditionen  till  Gronland,  dess 
inre  isoken  oeh  dess  ostkust,  utford  ar  /88j  (Stock- 


RUINS  OF  THE  CHURCH  AT  KATORTOK.* 


is  one  ol  the  earliest  books  to  give  an  account  of  the  Eskimos.  It  was  again  printed  in  1674  in  Recueil  de 
Voyages  du  Nord.  A Dutch  edition  at  Amsterdam  in  1678  ( Nauwkcnrige  Beschrijvingh  van  Groenland) 
was  considerably  enlarged  with  other  matter,  and  this  edition  was  the  basis  of  the  German  version  published 
at  Nuremberg,  1679.  Peyrere’s  description  will  be  found  in  English  in  a volume  published  by  the  Hakluyt 
Society  in  1855,  where  it  is  accompanied  by  two  maps  of  the  early  part  of  the  seventeenth  century.  Cf.  Carter- 
Brown,  ii.,  no.  1192,  note;  Sabin,  x.  p.  70. 

1 Pilling  ( Eskimo  Bibliog.,  p.  20)  gives  the  most  careful  account  of  editions.  Cf.  Sabin,  v.  66.  A Dutch 
translation  at  Haarlem  in  1767  was  provided  with  better  and  larger  maps  than  the  original  issue;  and  this 
version  was  again  brought  out  with  a changed  title  in  1786.  There  was  a Swedish  ed.  at  Stockholm  in  1769, 
and  a reprint  of  the  original  German  at  Leipzig  in  1770,  and  it  is  included  in  the  Bibliothek  der  neuesten 
Reisebeschreibungen  (Frankfort,  1779-1797),  vol.  xx.  Cf.  Carter-Brown,  ii.,  nos.  1443,  1576,  1577,  1671,  1728. 

2 This  constitutes  in  3 vols.  a sort  of  supplement  to  the  Antiquitates  Americana.  Cf.  Dublin  Review,  xxvii. 
35  ; Bulletin  de  la  Soc.  de  G'eog.  de  Paris,  3d  ser.,  vol.  vi.,  and  a synopsis  of  the  Mindesmceker  in  The 
Sacristy,  Feb.  1,  1871  (London). 

3 The  principal  ruin  is  that  of  a church,  and  it  will  be  found  represented  in  the  Antiquitates  Americana , 
and  again  by  Nordenskjold,  Steenstrup,  J.  T.  Smith  ( Discovery  of  America,  etc.),  Horsford ; and,  not  to  name 
more,  in  Hayes’s  Land  of  Desolation  (and  in  the  French  version  in  Tour  du  Monde,  xxvi.). 

* After  a cut  in  Nordenskjold’s  Den  Andra  Dicksonska  Expeditionen  till  Gronland , p.  369,  following  one 
in  Efter  Meddelelser  om  Gronland. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


87 


holm,  1885),  the  result  of  the  ripest  study  and 
closest  contact. 

We  need  also  to  scan  the  narratives  of  Hans 
Egede  and  Graah.  Parry  found  in  1824,  on  an 
island  on  the  Baltic  coast,  a runic  stone,  com- 
memorating the  occupancy  of  the  spot  in  1135 
(Antiquitates  Americana;  Mallet’s  Northern 
Antiquities,  248) ; and  in  1830  and  1831  other 
runes  were  found  on  old  gravestones  (Rink’s 
Danish  Greenland,  app.  v. ; Laing’s  Heims- 
kringla,  i.  151).  These  last  are  in  the  Museum 
at  Copenhagen.  Most  of  these  imperishable 
relics  have  been  found  in  the  district  of  Julianes- 
haab.1 

E.  The  Vinland  Voyages.  — What  Leif 
and  Karlsefne  knew  they  experienced,  and  what 
the  sagas  tell  us  they  underwent,  must  have  just 
the  difference  between  a crisp  narrative  of  per- 
sonal adventure  and  the  oft-repeated  and  em- 
bellished story  of  a fireside  narrator,  since  the 


traditions  of  the  Norse  voyages  were  not  put  in 
the  shape  of  records  till  about  two  centuries 
had  elapsed,  and  we  have  no  earlier  manuscript 
of  such  a record  than  one  made  nearly  two  hun- 
dred years  later  still.  It  is  indeed  claimed  that 
the  transmission  by  tradition  in  those  days  was  a 
different  matter  in  respect  to  constancy  and  ex- 
actness from  what  it  has  been  known  to  be  in 
later  times ; but  the  assumption  lacks  proof  and 
militates  against  well-known  and  inevitable  pro- 
cesses of  the  human  mind. 

In  regard  to  the  credibility  of  the  sagas,  the 
northern  writers  recognize  the  change  which 
came,  over  the  oral  traditionary  chronicles  when 
the  romancing  spirit  was  introduced  from  the 
more  southern  countries,  at  a time  while  the 
copies  of  the  sagas  which  we  now  have  were 
making,  after  having  been  for  so  long  a time 
orally  handed  down ; but  they  are  not  so  suc- 
cessful in  making  plain  what  influence  this  im- 
ported spirit  had  on  particular  sagas,  which  we 


/ 


cmbfta  fufoimijian  Auffcni§9  v lantt  ncT-vtf  jT 

ta  hew  l&wg  | Rfai  cetifoiafa  |Taji  Ijatbi&r  m a£  qgadjamt  ftau 

ijT  parvt-c  tnbfifc  ffitgat 


//.  Jr 


1 Rafn  in  his  Americas  arctiske  landes  Gam/e  Geographic  efter  de  Nordiske  Oldskrifter  (Copenhagen, 
1845)  gives  the  seals  of  some  of  the  Greenland  bishops,  various  plans  of  the  different  ruins,  a view  of  the 
Katortok  church  with  its  surroundings,  engraving  of  the  different  runic  inscriptions,  and  a map  of  the 
Julianehaab  district. 

’ * This  is  a portion  of  one  of  the  plates  in  the  Antiquitates  Americana,  given  by  Rafn  to  Charles  Sumner, 
with  a key  in  manuscript  by  Rafn  himself.  His  signature  is  from  a copy  of  his  Memoirc  given  by  him  to 
Edward  Everett,  and  now  in  Harvard  College  library. 


88 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


are  asked  to  receive  as  historical  records.  They 
seem  sometimes  to  forget  that  it  is  not  necessary 
to  have  culture,  heroes,  and  impossible  occur- 
rences to  constitute  a myth.  A blending  of  his- 
tory and  myth  prompts  Horn  to  say  “ that  some 
of  the  sagas  were  doubtless  originally  based  on 
facts,  but  the  telling  and  re-telling  have  changed 
them  into  pure  myths.”  The  unsympathetic 
stranger  sees  this  in  stories  that  the  patriotic 
Scandinavians  are  over-anxious  to  make  appear 
as  genuine  chronicles.1  It  is  certainly  unfortu- 
nate that  the  period  of  recording  the  older 
sagas  coincides  mainly  with  the  age  of  this 
southern  romancing  influence.2  It  is  a some- 


what anomalous  condition  when  long-transmitted 
oral  stories  are  assigned  to  history,  and  certain 
other  written  ones  of  the  age  of  the  recorded 
sagas  are  relegated  to  myth.  If  we  would  be- 
lieve some  of  the  northern  writers,  what  appears 
to  be  difference  in  kind  of  embellishment  was 
in  reality  the  sign  that  separated  history  from 
fable.3  Of  the  interpreters  of  this  olden  lore, 
Torfaeus  has  been  long  looked  upon  as  a charac- 
teristic exemplar,  and  Horn4  says  of  his  works 
that  they  are  “ perceptibly  lacking  in  criticism. 
Torfaeus  was  upon  the  whole  incapable  of  dis- 
tinguishing between  myth  and  history.”  6 

Erasmus  Rask,  in  writing  to  Wheaton  in 


RUIN  AT  KATORTOK.* 

1 This  tendency  of  the  Scandinavian  writers  is  recognized  among  themselves.  Horn  (Anderson’s  transla- 
tion, 324)  ascribes  it  to  “ an  unbridled  fancy  and  want  of  critical  method  rather  than  to  any  wilful  perversion 
of  historical  truth.  This  tendency  owed  its  origin  to  an  intense  patriotism,  a leading  trait  in  the  Swedish 
character,  which  on  this  very  account  was  well-nigh  incorrigible.” 

2 Dasent  translates  from  the  preface  to  Egils  Saga  (Reikjavik,  1856)  : “ The  sagas  show  no  wilful  purpose 
to  tell  untruths,  but  simply  are  proofs  of  the  beliefs  and  turns  of  thought  of  men  in  the  age  -when  the  sagas 
were  reduced  to  writing  ” (Burnt  Njal,  i.  p.  xiii). 

3 Rink  ( Danish  Greenland , p.  3)  says  of  the  sagas  that  “ they  exist  only  in  a fragmentary  condition,  and 
bear  the  general  character  of  popular  traditions  to  such  a degree  that  they  stand  much  in  need  of  being  cor- 
roborated by  collateral  proofs,  if  we  are  wholly  to  rely  upon  them  in  such  a question  as  an  ancient  colonization 
of  America.”  So  he  proceeds  to  enumerate  the  kind  of  evidence,  which  is  sufficient  in  Greenland,  but  is 
wholly  wanting  in  other  parts  of  America,  and  to  point  out  that  the  trustworthiness  of  the  sagas  of  the  Vin- 
land  voyages  exists  only  in  regard  to  their  general  scope. 

Dasent,  in  the  introduction  of  Vigfusson’s  Icelandic  Dictionary , says  of  the  sagas : “ Written  at  various 
periods  by  scribes  more  or  less  fitted  for  the  task,  they  are  evidently  of  very  varying  authority.”  The  Scan- 
dinavian authorities  class  the  sagas  as  mythical  histories,  as  those  relating  to  Icelandic  history  (subdivided  into 
general,  family,  personal,  ecclesiastical),  and  as  the  lives  of  rulers. 

4 Anderson’s  translation,  Lit.  of  the  Scand.  North , p.  81. 

5 Laing  (Heimskringlc  ,\.  23)  says  : “Arne  Magnussen  was  the  greatest  antiquary  who  never  wrote:  his 
judgments  and  opinions  are  known  from  notes,  selections,  and  correspondence,  and  are  of  great  authority  at 
this  day  in  the  saga  literature.  Torfaeus  consulted  him  in  his  researches.” 

* After  a cut  in  Nordenskjold’s  Exfed.  till  Gronland , p.  371,  following  the  Meddel.  om  Gronland,  vi.  98. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


89 


1 83 1,1  enumerates  eight  of  the  early  manu- 
scripts which  mention  Vinland  and  the  voyages ; 
but  Rafn,  in  1837,  counted  eighteen  such  manu- 
scripts.2 We  know  little  or  nothing  about  the 
recorders  or  date  of  any  of  these  copies,  except- 
ing the  Heims kringlap  nor  how  long  they  had 
existed  orally.  Some  of  them  were  doubtless 
put  into  writing  soon  after  the  time  when  such 
recording  was  introduced,  and  this  date  is  some- 
times put  as  early  as  a.  d.  1120,  and  sometimes 
as  late  as  the  middle  or  even  end  of  that  cen- 
tury. Meanwhile,  Adam  of  Bremen,  in  the 
latter  part  of  the  eleventh  century  (a.  D.  1073), 


prepared  his  Historia  Ecclesiasiica,  an  account 
of  the  spread  of  Christianity  in  the  north,  in 
which  he  says  he  was  told  by  the  Danish  king 
that  his  subjects  had  found  a country  to  the 
west,  called  W inland.4  A reference  is  also  sup- 
posed to  be  made  in  the  Historia  Ecclesiastica  of 
Ordericus  Vitalis,  written  about  the  middle  (say 
A.  D.  1140)  of  the  twelfth  century.  But  it  was 
not  until  somewhere  between  a.  d.  1385  and 
1400  that  the  oldest  Icelandic  manuscript  which 
exists,  touching  the  voyages,  was  compiled,  — 
the  so-called  Codex  Flatoyensis ,5  though  how 
much  earlier  copies  of  it  were  made  is  not 


1 Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc .,  xviii.  20. 

2 Oswald  Moosmiiller’s  Europaer  in  Amerika  vor  Columbus  (Regensburg,  1879,  P-  4)  enumerates  the 
manuscripts  in  the  royal  library  in  Copenhagen. 

8 A.  E.  Wollheim’s  Die  Nat.  lit.  der  Scandinavier  (Berlin,  1875-77),  p.  47.  Turner’s  Anglo  Saxons,  book 
iv.  ch.  1.  Mallet’s  No.  Antiq.  (1847),  393. 

4 Cf.  G.  H.  Pertz,  Monumenta  Germania  historica,  1846,  vol.  vii.  cap.  247.  Of  the  different  manuscripts, 
some  call  Vinland  a “ regio  ” and  others  an  “ insu'a.” 

6 Discovered  in  the  seventeenth  century  in  a monastery  on  an  island  close  by  the  Icelandic  coast,  and  now 

• Note.  — The  above  is  a reproduction  of  a corner  map  in  the  map  of  Danish  Greenland  given  in  Rink’s 
book  of  that  name.  The  sea  in  the  southwest  corner  of  the  cut  is  not  shaded ; but  shading  is  given  to  the 
interior  ice  field  on  the  northern  and  northeastern  part  of  the  map.  Rink  gives  a similar  map  of  the  Wester- 
bygd. 


go 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


known.  It  is  in  this  manuscript  that  we  find  the 
saga  of  Olaf  Tryggvesson,1  wherein  the  voyages 
of  Leif  Ericson  are  described,  and  it  is  only  by 
a comparison  of  circumstances  detailed  here  and 
in  other  sagas  that  the  year  a.  d.  iooo  has  been 
approximately  determined  as  the  date.2  In  this 
same  codex  we  find  the  saga  of  Eric  the  Red, 
one  of  the  chief  narratives  depended  upon  by 


the  advocates  of  the  Norse  discovery,  and  in 
Rask’s  judgment  it  “ appears  to  be  somewhat 
fabulous,  written  long  after  the  event,  and  taken 
from  tradition.”  3 

The  other  principal  saga  is  that  of  Thorfinn 
Karlsefne,  which  with  some  differences  and 
with  the  same  lack  of  authenticity,  goes  over  the 
ground  covered  by  that  of  Eric  the  Red.4 


RAFN. 


in  the  royal  library  in  Copenhagen.  Cf.  Laing’s  introduction  to  his  edition  of  the  Hcimskringla , vol.  L 
p.  157.  Horn  says  of  this  codex  : “ The  book  was  written  towards  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  century  by  two 
Icelandic  priests,  and  contains  in  strange  confusion  and  wholly  without  criticism  a large  number  of  sagas, 
poems,  and  stories.  No  other  manuscript  confuses  things  on  so  vast  a scale.”  Anderson’s  translation  of 
Horn’s  Lit.  of  the  Scandin.  North , p.  60.  Cf.  Flatcyjarbok.  En  Samling  af  Norske  Konge-Sagacr  med 
indskudtc  mindre  fortallinger  om  Begivenheder  i og  Udenfor  Norge  samt  Annaler  (Christiania,  i860)  ; and 
Vigfusson’s  and  Unger’s  edition  of  1868,  also  at  Christiania.  The  best  English  account  of  the  Codex  Flatoy - 
ensis  is  by  Gudbrand  Vigfusson  in  the  preface  to  his  Icelandic  Sagas,  published  under  direction  of  the 
Master  of  the  Rolls,  London,  1887,  vol.  i.  p.  xxv. 

1 For  texts,  see  C.  C.  Rafn’s  edition  of  Kong  Olaf  Tryggvesons  Saga  (Copenhagen,  1826),  and  Munch’s 
edition  of  Kong  Olaf  Tryggveson's  Saga  (Christiania,  1853).  Cf.  also  P.  A.  Munch’s  Norges  Konge-Sagaer 
of  Snorri  Sturleson,  Sturh  Thordsson,  etc.  (Christiania,  1859). 

2 The  Codex  Platoyensis  says  that  it  wa-  sixteen  winters  afteT  the  settlement  of  Greenland  before  Leif  went 
to  Norway,  and  that  in  the  next  year  he  sailed  to  Vinland. 

8 Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  xviii.  21. 

4 These  sagas  are  given  in  Icelandic,  Danish,  and  Latin  in  Rafn’s  Antiquitates  Americana  (Copenhagen, 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


91 


Of  all  the  early  manuscripts,  the  well-known  be  received  as  an  historical  record,  and  all  that 
Heimskringla  of  Snorro  Sturleson  (b.  1178  ; d.  it  says  is  in  these  words  : “Leif  also  found  Vin- 
1241),  purporting  to  be  a history  of  the  Norse  land  the  Good.”1 

kings  down  to  A.  D.  1177,  is  the  most  entitled  to  Saxo  Grammaticus  (d.  about  1208 J in  his  His- 

HISTORIA 

VINLAN- 

DLE  ANTIQViL 

feu 

Parris  America  Septemrionalis, 

ubi 

Nominis  ratio  recenfetur, 
fitus  terra  ex  dierumbru- 

malium  fpatio  expendicur,foIi  ferti- 
litas  & mcolarum  barbaries,per- 
egrinorum  temporarius  incolatus& 
gefta,  vicinarum.  terrarum  no- 
mina  & facies 

ex 

Antiqvitatibus  Islandicis  in  Iucem 
produ&a  exponuntur 
per 

THORMODUM  TORFiEUM 

Rerum  Norvegicarum  Hifloriographuffl  Regium. 

' “ HAVNIJE, 

Ex  Typography  Regia;  Majeft.dcUniverfit*  1 70  f» 

Impends  Authoris. 


1837).  Versions  or  abstracts,  more  or  less  full,  of  all, or  of  some  of  them  are  given  by  Beamish,  in  his  Discov- 
ery  of  America  by  the  Northvien  (London,  1841),  whose  text  is  reprinted  by  Slafter,  in  his  Voyages  of  the 
Northmen  (Boston,  1877).  J.  Elliot  Cabot,  in  the  Mass.  Quart.  Review,  March,  1S49,  copied  in  part  in 
Higginson’s  Amer.  Explorers.  Blackwell,  in  his  supplementary  chapters  to  Mallet’s  Northerti  A ntiquities 
(London,  Bohn’s  library).  B.  F.  De  Costa,  in  his  Pre-Columbiaji  Discovery  of  America  (Albany,  1868). 
Eben  Norton  Horsford,  in  his  Discovery  of  America  by  Norsemen  (Boston,  18S8).  Beauvois,  in  his  Dccoir 
vertes  ties  Scandinaves  en  Amerique  (Paris,  1839).  P.  E.  Muller,  in  his  Sagabibliothek  (Copenhagen’ 
1S16-20),  and  a German  version  of  part  of  it  by  Lachmann,  Sagenbibliothek  des  Scandinavischen  Alterthums 
in  Ausziigen  (Berlin,  1816). 

1 When,  however,  Peringskiold  edited  the  Heimskringla , in  1697,  he  interpolated  eight  chapters  of  a more 
particular  account  of  the  Vinland  voyages,  which  drew  forth  some  animadversions  from  Torfaeus  in  1705,  when 
he  published  his  Historia  Vinlandite.  It  was  later  found  that  Peringskiold  had  drawn  these  eight  chapters 


92 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


toria  Danica  begins  with  myths,  and  evidently 
follows  the  sagas,  but  does  not  refer  to  them 
except  in  his  preface.1 

For  about  five  hundred  years  after  this  the 
stories  attracted  little  or  no  attention.2  We 
have  seen  that  Peringskiold  produced  these 
sagas  in  1697.  Montanus  in  his  Nieuwe  en  on- 
bekende  Weereld  (Amsterdam,  1671),  and  Cam- 
panius,  in  1702,  in  his  Kort  Beskrifnitig  om 
Provincien  Nya  Swerige  uti  America  (Stock- 
holm),3 gave  some  details.  The  account  which 
did  most,  however,  to  revive  an  interest  in  the 
subject  was  that  of  Torfaeus  in  his  Historia 
VinlandicB  Antiques  (Copenhagen,  1705),  but  he 
was  quite  content  to  place  the  scene  of  his  nar- 
rative in  America,  without  attempting  to  iden- 
tify localities.4  The  voyages  were,  a few  years 
later,  the  subject  of  a dissertation  at  the  Uni- 
versity of  Upsala  in  Sweden.6  J.  P.  Cassell,  of 
Bremen,  discusses  the  Adam  of  Bremen  story 
in  another  Latin  essay,  still  later.6 

About  1750,  Pieter  Kalm,  a Swede,  brought 
the  matter  to  the  attention  of  Dr.  Franklin,  as 
the  latter  remembered  twenty-five  years  later, 
when  he  wrote  to  Samuel  Mather  that  “the  cir- 


cumstances gave  the  account  a great  appearance 
of  authenticity.”  7 In  1755,  Paul  Henri  Mallet 
( 1 7 30- 1 807 ) , in  his  Histoire  de  Dannemarc,  de- 
termines the  localities  to  be  Labrador  and 
N ewfoundland.8 

In  1769,  Gerhard  Schoning,  in  his  Norge s 
Riges  Historic , established  the  scene  in  America. 
Robertson,  in  1777,  briefly  mentions  the  voyages 
in  his  Hist,  of  America  (note  xvii.),  and,  refer- 
ring to  the  accounts  given  by  Peringskiold,  calls 
them  rude  and  confused,  and  says  that  it  is 
impossible  to  identify  the  landfalls,  though  he 
thinks  Newfoundland  may  have  been  the  scene 
of  Vinland.  This  is  also  the  belief  of  J.  R. 
Forster  in  his  Geschichte  der  Entdeckungen  im 
Norden  (Frankfurt,  1784).9  M.  C.  Sprengel,  in 
his  Geschichte  der  Europder  in  Nordamerika 
(Leipzig,  1782),  thinks  they  went  as  far  south  as 
Carolina.  Pontoppidan’s  History  of  Norway 
was  mainly  followed  by  Dr.  Jeremy  Belknap  in 
his  American  Biography  (Boston,  1794),  who 
recognizes  “ circumstances  to  confirm  and  none 
to  disprove  the  relations.”  In  1793,  Munoz,  in 
his  Historia  del  Nuevo  Mundo,  put  Vinland  in 
Greenland.  In  1796  there  was  a brief  account 


from  the  Codex  Flatoyensis,  which  particular  MS.  was  unknown  to  Torfteus.  When  Laing  printed  his  edition 
of  the  Heimskringla,  The  Sea  Kings  of  Norway  (London,  1844),  he  translated  these  eight  chapters  in  his 
appendix  (vol.  iii.  344).  Laing  {Heimskringla,  i.  27)  says:  “Snorro  Sturleson  has  done  for  the  history  of 
the  Northmen  what  Livy  did  for  the  history  of  the  Romans,”  — a rather  questionable  tribute  to  the  verity  of 
the  saga  history,  in  the  light  of  the  most  approved  comments  on  Livy.  Cf.  Horn,  in  Anderson’s  translation, 
Lit.  of  the  Scandinavian  North  (Chicago,  1884),  p.  56,  with  references,  p.  59. 

1 J.  Fulford  Vicary’s  Saga  Time  (Lond.,  1887).  Some  time  in  the  fifteenth  century,  a monk,  Thomas 
Gheysmer,  made  an  abridgment  of  Saxo,  alleging  that  he  “ had  said  much  rather  for  the  sake  of  adornment 
than  in  behalf  of  truth.”  The  Canon  Christiern  Pederson  printed  the  first  edition  of  Saxo  at  Paris  in  1514 
(Anderson’s  Horn’s  Lit.  Scandin.  North,  p.  102).  This  writer  adds  : “ The  entire  work  rests  exclusively  on 
oral  tradition,  which  had  been  gathered  by  Saxo,  and  which  he  repeated  precisely  as  he  had  heard  it,  for  in  the 
whole  chronicle  there  is  no  trace  of  criticism  proper.  . . . Saxo  must  also  undoubtedly  have  had  Icelandic 
sagamen  as  authorities  for  the  legendary  part  of  his  work  ; but  there  is  not  the  slightest  evidence  to  show  that 
he  ever  had  a written  Icelandic  saga  before  him.  ...  In  this  part  of  the  work  he  betrays  no  effort  to  separate 
fact  from  fiction,  . . . and  he  has  in  many  instances  consciously  or  unconsciously  adorned  the  original  mate- 
rial.” Horn  adds  that  the  last  and  best  edition  is  that  of  P.  E.  Muller  and  J.  Velchow,  Saxonis  Grammatics 
Historia  Danica  (Copenhagen,  1839). 

2 Humboldt  ( Crit . Exam.,  ii.  120)  represented  that  Ortelius  referred  to  these  voyages  in  1570;  but  Palfrey 
(Hist.  New  England,  i.  51)  shows  that  the  language  cited  by  Humboldt  was  not  used  by  Ortelius  till  in  his 
edition  of  1592,  an*l  that  then  he  referred  to  the  Zeno  narrative. 

3 See  post,  Vol.  IV.  p.  492. 

4 His  account  is  followed  by  Malte  Brun  in  his  Precis  de  la  Geographic  (i.  395).  Cf.  also  Annales  des 
Voyages  ( Paris,  1810),  x.  50,  and  his  Geographic  Universelle  (Paris,  1841).  Pinkerton,  in  his  Voyages  (Lon- 
don, 1814),  vol.  xvii.,  also  followed  Torfteus. 

5 J.  J.  Wahlstedt’s  Iter  in  Americam  (Upsala,  1725).  Cf.  Brinley  Catal.,  i.  59. 

6 Observatio  historica  ad  Frisonum  navigatione  fortuita  in  Americam  sec.  xi.  facta  (Magdeburg,  1741). 

7 Franklin's  Works,  Philad.,  1809,  vol.  vi. ; Sparks’s  ed.,  viii.  69. 

8 This  is  the  book  which  furnished  the  text  in  an  English  dress  (London,  r77o)  known  as  Northern  Anti- 
quities, and  a part  of  his  account  is  given  in  the  American  Museum  (Philad.,  1789).  In  the  Edinburgh  edition 
of  1809  it  is  called:  Northern  antiquities : or  a description  of  the  manners,  customs,  religion  and  laws,  of 
the  ancient  Danes,  including  those  of  our  Saxon  ancestors.  With  a translation  of  the  Edda  and  other 
pieces,  from  the  ancient -celandic  tongue.  Translated  from  “ L' introduction  it  Vhistoire  de  Dannemarc , 
&c.,”  par  Mons.  Mallet.  With  additional  notes  by  the  English  translator  [ Bishop  Percy],  and  Goranson's 
Latin  version  of  the  Edda.  In  2 vols.  The  chapters  defining  the  locations  are  omitted,  and  others  substi- 
tuted, in  the  reprint  of  the  Northern  Antiquities  in  Bohn’s  library. 

9 There  are  French  and  English  versions. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


93 


in  Fritsch’s  Disputatio  historico-geographica  in 
qua  quceritur  utrum  veter es  Americam  noverint 
necne.  H.  Stenstrdm  published  at  Lund,  in 
1801,  a short  dissertation,  De  America  Norvegis 
ante  tempora  Colnmbi  adita.  Boucher  de  la 
Richarderie,  in  his  Bibliothlque  Universelle  des 
Voyages  (Paris,  1808),  gives  a short  account, 
and  cites  some  of  the  authorities.  Some  of  the 
earlier  American  histories  of  this  century,  like 
Williamson’s  North  Carolina,  took  advantage 
of  the  recitals  of  Torfaeus  and  Mallet.  Ebenezer 
Henderson’s  Residence  in  Iceland  (1814-15)  1 
presented  the  evidence  anew.  Barrow,  in  his 
Voyages  to  the  Arctic  Regions  (London,  1818), 
places  Vinland  in  Labrador  or  Newfoundland; 
but  J.  W.  Moulton,  in  his  History  of  the  State 
of  New  York  (N.  Y.,  1824),  brings  that  State 
within  the  region  supposed  to  have  been  visited. 

A writer  more  likely  to  cause  a determinate 
opinion  in  the  public  mind  came  in  Washington 
living,  who  in  his  Columbus  (London,  1828)  dis- 
missed the  accounts  as  untrustworthy;  though 
later,  under  the  influence  of  Wheaton  and 
Rafn,  he  was  inclined  to  consider  them  of  pos- 
sible importance ; and  finally  in  his  condensed 
edition  he  thinks  the  facts  “established  to  the 
conviction  of  most  minds.”  2 Hugh  Murray,  in 
his  Discoveries  and  Travels  in  North  America 
(London,  1829),  regards  the  sagas  as  an  author- 
ity ; but  he  doubts  the  assigning  of  Vinland  to 
America.  In  1830,  W.  D.  Cooley,  in  his  His- 
tory of  Maritime  and  Inland  Discovery ,3  thought 
it  impossible  to  shake  the  authenticity  of  the 
sagas. 

While  Henry  Wheaton  was  the  minister  of 
the  United  States  at  Copenhagen,  and  having 
access  to  the  collections  of  that  city,  he  pre- 
pared his  History  of  the  iVorthmcn,  which  was 
published  in  London  and  Philadelphia  in  1831.4 
The  high  character  of  the  man  gave  unusual 

1 Edinburgh,  1818  ; Boston,  1831. 

2 Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  1865,  p.  184. 

8  Lordlier’ s Cabinet  Cyclopeedia. 

4 Allibone,  iii.  2667. 

5 Irving,  in  reviewing  the  book  in  the  No.  Am.  Rev.,  Oct.,  1832,  avoided  the  question  of  the  Norse  dis- 
covery. (Cf.  his  Spanish  Papers,  vol.  ii.,  and  Rice’s  Essays  from  the  No.  Am.  Rev.)  C.  Robinson,  in  his 
Discoveries  in  the  West  (ch.  1 ),  borrows  from  Wheaton. 

G Octavo  ed.,  i.  pp.  5,  6. 

7 Orig.  ed.,  iii.  313;  last  revision,  ii.  132. 

8 This  society,  Kongelige  Nordiske  Oldskrift-Selskab,  since  1 S25,  has  been  issuing  works  and  periodicals 
illustrating  all  departments  of  Scandinavian  archaeology  (cf.  Webb,  in  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  viii.  177),  and 
has  gathered  cabinets  and  museums,  sections  of  which  are  devoted  to  American  subjects.  C.  C.  Rafn’s  Cabi- 
net d’antiquites  Americaincs  h Copenhaguc  (Copenhagen,  185S)  ; Journal  of  the  Royal  Geographical 
Society,  xiv.  316 ; Slafter’s  introd.  to  his  Voyages  of  the  Northmen. 

9 Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  viii.  81  ; Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  April,  1865  ; N.  E.  Hist.  Geneal.  Reg.,  1865, 
p.  273  ; Today,  ii.  176. 

10  Professor  Willard  Fiske  has  paid  particular  attention  to  the  early  forms  of  the  Danish  in  the  Icelandic 
literature.  In  1885  the  British  Museum  issued  a Catalogue  of  the  books  printed  in  Iceland  from  A.  D.  1578 
to  rSSo  in  the  library  of  the  British  Museum.  In  1886  Mr.  Fiske  privately  printed  at  Florence  Bibliograph- 
ical Notices,  i. : Books  printed  in  Iceland,  iyjS-1844,  a supplement  to  the  British  Museum  Catalogue , 


force  to  his  opinions,  and  his  epitome  of  the 
sagas  in  his  second  chapter  contributed  much 
to  increase  the  interest  in  the  Northmen  story. 
He  was  the  first  who  much  impressed  the  New 
England  antiquaries  with  the  view  that  Vinland 
should  be  looked  for  in  New  England;  and  a 
French  version  by  Paul  Guillot,  issued  in  Paris  in 
1844,  is  stated  to  have  been  “ revue  et  augmen- 
tee  par  l’auteur,  avec  cartes,  inscriptions,  et  al- 
phabet runique.” 5 The  opinions  of  Wheaton, 
however,  had  no  effect  upon  the  leading  histo- 
rian of  the  United  States,  nor  have  any  subse- 
quent developments  caused  any  change  in  the 
opinion  of  Bancroft,  first  advanced  in  1834,  in 
the  opening  volume  of  his  United  States,  where 
he  dismissed  the  sagas  as  “ mythological  in 
form  and  obscure  in  meaning ; ancient  yet  not 
contemporary.”  He  adds  that  “the  intrepid 
mariners  who  colonized  Greenland  could  easily 
have  extended  their  voyage  to  Labrador ; but 
no  dear  historical  evidence  establishes  the  nat- 
ural probability  that  they  accomplished  the  pas- 
sage.” 6 All  this  is  omitted  by  Bancroft  in  his 
last  revised  edition ; but  a paragraph  in  his 
original  third  volume  (1840),  to  the  intent  that, 
though  “ Scandinavians  may  have  reached  the 
shores  of  Labrador,  the  soil  of  the  United 
States  has  not  one  vestige  of  their  presence,”  is 
allowed  to  remain,7  and  is  true  now  as  when 
first  written. 

The  chief  apostle  of  the  Norseman  belief, 
however,  is  Carl  Christian  Rafn,  whose  work 
was  accomplished  under  the  auspices  of  the 
Royal  Society  of  Northern  Antiquaries  at  Co- 
penhagen.8 

Rafn  was  born  in  1795,  and  died  at  Copen- 
hagen in  1864.9  At  the  University,  as  well  as 
later  as  an  officer  of  its  library,  he  had  bent  his 
attention  to  the  early  Norse  manuscripts  and 
literature,10  so  that  in  1825  he  was  the  natural 


94 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 

* 


founder  of  the  Royal  Society  of  Northern  An- 
tiquaries; and  much  of  the  value  of  its  long 
series  of  publications  is  due  to  his  active  and 
unflagging  interest.1  The  summit  of  his  Amer- 
ican interest,  however,  was  reached  in  the  great 
folio  Antiquitates  Americana,2  in  which  he  for  the 
first  time  put  the  mass  of  original  Norse  docu- 
ments before  the  student,  and  with  a larger  accu- 
mulation of  proofs  than  had  ever  been  adduced 
before,  he  commented  on  the  narratives  and 


came  to  conclusions  respecting  traces  of  their 
occupancy  to  which  few  will  adhere  to-day. 

The  effect  of  Rafn’s  volume,  however,  was 
marked,  and  we  see  it  in  the  numerous  presen- 
tations of  the  subject  which  followed ; and  every 
writer  since  has  been  greatly  indebted  to  him. 

Alexander  von  Humboldt  in  his  Examen  Cri- 
tique (Paris,  1837)  gave  a synopsis  of  the  sagas, 
and  believed  the  scene  of  the  discoveries  to  be 
between  Newfoundland  and  New  York;  and  in 


which  enumerates  139  titles  with  full  bibliographical  detail  and  an  index.  He  refers  also  to  the  principal 
bibliographical  authorities.  Laing’s  introduction  to  the  Heimskringla  gives  a survey. 

1 Cf.  list  of  their  several  issues  in  Scudder’s  Catal.  of  Scient.  Serials,  nos.  640,  654,  and  the  Rafn  bibliog- 
raphy in  Sabin,  xvi.  nos.  67,466-67,486.  In  addition  to  its  Danish  publications,  the  chief  of  which  interesting 
to  the  American  archaeologist  being  the  Antiquarisk  Tidsskrift  (1845-1864),  sometimes  known  as  the  Revue 
Archeologique  et  Bulletin , the  society,  under  its  more  familiar  name  of  Societe  Royale  des  Antiquaires  du 
Nord,  has  issued  its  Memoires,  the  first  series  running  from  1836  to  i860,  in  4 vols.,  and  the  second  beginning 
in  1866.  These  contain  numerous  papers  involving  the  discussion  of  the  Northmen  voyages,  including  a con- 
densed narrative  by  Rafn,  “ Memoire  sur  la  decouverte  de  l’Amerique  au  ioe  siecle,”  which  was  enlarged  and 
frequently  issued  separately  in  French  and  other  languages  (1838-1843),  and  is  sometimes  found  in  English  as 
a Supplement  to  the  Antiquitatcs  Americana,  and  was  issued  in  New  York  (1838)  as  Antcrica  discovered  in 
the  tenth  century.  In  this  form  ( Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  viii.  187)  it  was  widely  used  here  and  in  Europe  to 
call  attention  to  Rafn’s  folio,  Antiquitafks  Americana. 

The  Mctnoires  also  contained  another  paper  by  Rafn,  Aperqu  de  Vancienne  geographie  des  regions 
arctiques  de  I'Amerique,  selon  les  rapports  contenus  dans  les  Sagas  du  (Copenhagen,  1847),  which 

also  concerns  the  Vinland  voyages,  and  is  repeated  in  the  Nouvelles  Annales  des  Voyages  (1849),  i.  277. 

2 Antiqvitates  Americana  sive  scriptores  septentrionales  rerum  antc-Columbianarum  in  America. 
Samling  af  de  i nordens  oldskrifter  indeholdte  efterretninger  om  de  gamle  nordboers  opdagelsesreiser  til 
America  fra  det  lode  til  det  iqde  aarhundrede.  Edidit  Societas  regia  antiquariorum  Septentrionalium 
(Hafnise,  1837).  Contents:  Prafatio.  — Conspectus  codicum  membraneorum,  in  quibus  terrarum  Ameri- 
canarum  mentio  fit.  — America  discovered  by  the  Scandinavians  in  the  tenth  century.  (An  abstract  of  the 
historical  evidence  contained  in  this  work.)  — Piettir  af  Eireki  Rauda  ok  Gramlendingum.  — Saga  Porfinns 
Karlsefnis  ok  Snorra  Porbrandssonar.  — Breviores  relationes : De  inhabitatione  Islandiae  ; De  inhabitatione 
Groenlandke;  De  Ario  Maris  filio  ; De  Bjorne  Breidvikensium  athleta;  De  Gudleivo  Gudlcegi  filio  ; Excerpta 
ex  annalibus  Islandorum ; Die  mansione  Grcenlandorum  in  locis  Borealibus ; Excerpta  e geographicis  scriptis 
veterum  Islandorum  ; Carmen  Faeroicum,  in  quo  Vinlandiae  mentio  fit ; Adami  Bremensis  Relatio  de  Vin- 
landia ; Descriptio  quorumdam  monumentorum  Europaeorum,  quae  in  oris  Gronlandiae  ocidentalibus  reperta 
et  detecta  sunt ; Descriptio  vetusti  monumenti  in  regione  Massachusetts  reperti ; Descriptio  vetustorum 
quorundain  monumentorum  in  Rhode  Island.  — Annotationes  geographicae  ; Islandia  et  Gronlandia  ; Indagatio 
Arctoarum  Americae  regionum. — Indagatio  Orientalium  America:  regionum.  Addenda  et  emendanda. 
Indexes.  The  larger  works  are  in  Icelandic,  Danish,  and  Latin. 

Cf.  also  his  Antiquites  Americaines  d'aprbs  les  monuments  historiques  des  Islandais  et  des  anciens 
Scandinaves  (Copenhagen,  1845).  An  abstract  of  the  evidence  is  given  in  th & Journal  of  the  Royal  Geo- 
graphical Society  (viii.  114),  and  it  is  upon  this  that  H.  H.  Bancroft  depends  in  his  Native  Races  (v.  106). 
Cf.  also  Ibid.  v.  115-116  ; and  his  Cent.  America,  i.  74-  L.  Dussieux  in  his  Les  Grands  Faits  de  l Histoire 
de  la  Geographie  (Paris,  1882;  vol.  i.  147,  165)  follows  Rafn  and  Malte-Brun.  So  does  Brasseur  de  Bour- 
bourg  in  his  Hist,  de  Nations  Civilisees,\.  18;  and  Bachiller  y Morales  in  his  Antiguedades  Americanos 
(Havana,  1845). 

Great  efforts  were  made  by  Rafn  and  his  friends  to  get  reviews  of  his  folio  in  American  periodicals ; and  he 
relied  in  this  matter  upon  Dr.  Webb  and  others,  with  whom  he  had  been  in  correspondence  in  working  up  his 
geographical  details  (Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  ii.  97,  107 ; viii.  189,  etc.),  and  so  late  as  1852  he  drafted  in 
English  a new  synopsis  of  the  evidence,  and  sent  it  over  for  distribution  in  the  United  States  (Ibid.  ii.  580  ; 
New  Jersey  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  vi. ; N.  E.  Hist.  Geneal.  Reg.,  1853,  p.  13).  So  far  as  weight  of  character  went, 
there  was  a plenty  of  it  in  his  reviewers:  Edward  Everett  in  the  No.  Amer.  Rev.,  Jan.,  1838;  Alexander 

* Opposite  is  a section  of  Rafn’s  map  in  the  Antiqvitates  Americana,  giving  his  identification  of  the  Norse 
localities.  This  and  the  other  map  by  Rafn  is  reproduced  in  his  Cabinet  d’ Antiquites  Americaines  (Copen- 
hagen, 1858).  The  map  in  the  atlas  of  St.  Martin’s  Hist,  de  la  Geographie  does  not  track  them  below  New- 
foundland. The  map  in  J.  T.  Smith’s  Northmen  in  New  England  (Boston,  1S39)  shows  elever  voyages  to 
America  from  Scandinavia,  A.  d.  861-1285.  Cf.  map  in  Wilhelmi’s  Island,  etc.  (Heidelberg,  1842). 


NORSE  AMERICA. 


96 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


his  Cosmos  (1844)  he  reiterated  his  views,  hold- 
ing to  “ the  undoubted  first  discovery  by  the 
Northmen  as  far  south  as  410  30'.” 1 

Two  books  which  for  a while  were  the  popu- 
lar treatises  on  the  subject  were  the  immediate 
outcome  of  Rafn’s  book.  The  first  of  these 
was  The  Northmen  in  New  England , giving  the 
stories  in  the  form  of  a dialogue,  by  Joshua 
Toulmin  Smith  (Boston,  1839),  which  in  a 
second  edition  (London,  1842)  was  called  The 
Discovery  of  America  by  the  Northmen  in  the 
Tenth  Century. 

The  other  book  was  largely  an  English  ver- 
sion of  parts  of  Rafn’s  book,  translating  the 
chief  sagas,  and  reproducing  the  maps:  Natha- 
niel Ludlow  Beamish’s  Discovery  of  America  by 
the  Northmen  in  the  Tenth  Century  (London, 
1841  ).2  Two  German  books  owed  almost  as 
much  to  Rafn,  those  of  K.  Wilhelmi8  and  K. 
H.  Hermes.4  Prescott,  at  this  time  publishing 
the  third  volume  of  his  Mexico  (1843),  accords  to 
Rafn  the  credit  of  taking  the  matter  out  of  the 
category  of  doubt,  but  he  hesitates  to  accept 
the  Dane’s  identifications  of  localities ; but  R. 
H.  Major,  in  considering  the  question  in  the  in- 
troduction to  his  Select  letters  of  Columbus  (1847), 


finds  little  hesitation  in  accepting  the  views  of 
Rafn,  and  thinks  “ no  room  is  left  for  disputing 
the  main  fact  of  discovery.” 

When  Hildreth,  in  1849,  published  his  United 
States,  he  ranged  himself,  with  his  distrusts,  by 
the  side  of  Bancroft  but  J.  Elliot  Cabot,  in  mak- 
ing a capital  summary  of  the  evidence  in  the 
Mass.  Quarterly  Review  (vol.  ii.),  accords  with 
the  believers,  but  places  the  locality  visited 
about  Labrador  and  Newfoundland.  Haven  in 
his  Archeology  of  the  United  States  (Washington, 
1856)  regards  the  discovery  as  well  attested, 
and  that  the  region  was  most  likely  that  of  Nar- 
ragansett  Bay.  C.  W.  Elliott  in  his  New  Eng- 
land History  (N.  Y.,  1857)  holds  the  story  to  be 
“in  some  degree  mythical.”  Palfrey  in  his  Hist, 
of  New  England  (Boston,  1858)  goes  no  farther 
than  to  consider  the  Norse  voyage  as  in  “nowise 
unlikely,”  and  Oscar  F.  Peschel  in  his  Geschickte 
des  Zeitalters  der  Entdeckungen  (Stuttgart,  1858) 
is  on  the  affirmative  side.  Paul  K.  Sinding  goes 
over  the  story  with  assent  in  his  History  of  Scan- 
dinavia,— a book  not  much  changed  in  his 
Scandinavian  Races  (N.  Y.,  1878).®  Eugene 
Beauvois  did  little  more  than  translate  from 
Rafn  in  his  Decouvertes  des  Scandinaves  en 


Everett  in  the  U.  S.  Magazine  and  Democratic  Review  (1838) ; George  Folsom  in  the  N.  Y.  Review  (1838); 
H.  R.  Schoolcraft  in  the  Amer.  Biblical  Repository  (1839).  Cf.  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  viii.  182-3 ; Poole's 
Index,  28,  928. 

1 Bohn’s  ed.,  English  transl.,  ii.  603 ; Lond.  ed.,  1849,  ii.  233-36.  Humboldt  expresses  the  opinion  that 
Columbus,  during  his  visit  to  Iceland,  got  no  knowledge  of  the  stories,  so  little  an  impression  had  they  made  on 
the  public  mind  (Cosmos,  Bohn,  ii.  61 1),  and  that  the  enemies  of  Columbus  in  his  famous  lawsuit,  when  every 
effort  was  made  to  discredit  his  enterprise,  did  not  instance  his  Iceland  experience,  should  be  held  to  indicate 
that  no  one  in  southern  Europe  believed  in  any  such  prompting  at  that  time.  Wheaton  and  Prescott  (Ferdi- 
nand and  Isabella,  orig.  ed.,  ii.  118, 131)  hold  similar  opinions.  (Cf.  Vol.  II.  p.  33.)  Dr.  Webb  says  that  Irving 
held  back  from  accepting  the  stories  of  the  saga,  for  fear  that  they  could  be  used  to  detract  from  Columbus’ 
fame.  Rafn  and  his  immediate  sympathizers  did  not  fail  to  make  the  most  of  the  supposition  that  Columbus 
had  in  some  way  profited  by  his  Iceland  experience.  Eaing  thinks  Columbus  must  have  heard  of  the  voyages, 
and  De  Costa  ( Columbus  and  the  Geographers  of  the  North)  thinks  that  the  bruit  of  the  Northmen 
voyages  extended  sufficiently  over  Europe  to  render  it  unlikely  that  it  escaped  the  ears  of  Columbus.  Cf. 
further  an  appendix  in  Irving’s  Columbus,  and  Mallet’s  Northern  Antiquities,  Bohn’s  ed.,  267,  in  refutation 
of  the  conclusions  of  Finn  Magnusen  in  the  Nordisk  Tidsskrift.  It  has  been  left  for  the  unwise  and  over- 
topped advocates  of  a later  day,  like  Goodrich  and  Marie  A.  Brown,  to  go  beyond  reason  in  an  indiscriminate 
denunciation  of  the  Genoese.  The  latter  writer,  in  her  Icelandic  Discoverers  of  America  (Boston,  1888), 
rambles  over  the  subject  in  a jejune  way,  and  easily  falls  into  errors,  while  she  pursues  her  main  purpose 
of  exposing  what  she  fancies  to  be  a deep-laid  scheme  of  the  Pope  and  the  Catholic  Church  to  conceal  the 
merits  of  the  Northmen  and  to  capture  the  sympathies  of  Americans  in  honoring  the  memory  of  Columbus  in 
1892.  It  is  simply  a reactionary  craze  from  the  overdone  raptures  of  the  school  of  Roselly  de  Lorgues  and 
the  other  advocates  of  the  canonization  of  Columbus,  in  Catholic  Europe. 

2 This  book  is  for  the  sagas  the  basis  of  the  most  useful  book  on  the  subject,  Edmund  Farwell  Slafter’s 
Voyages  of  the  Northmen  to  America.  Including  extracts  from  Icelandic  Sagas  relating  to  Western 
voyages  by  Northmen  in  the  10th  and  nth  centuries  in  an  English  translation  by  Nathaniel  Ludlow 
Beamish  ; with  a synopsis  of  the  historical  evidence  and  the  opinion  of  professor  Rafn  as  to  the  places  visited 
by  the  Scandinavians  on  the  coast  of  America.  With  an  introduction  (Boston,  1S77),  published  by  the 
Prince  Society.  Slafter’s  opinion  is  that  the  narratives  are  “ true  in  their  general  outlines  and  important 
features.” 

3 Island,  Huitramannaland,  Gronland  und  Vinland  (Heidelberg,  1842). 

4 Die  Entdeckung  von  Amcrika  durch  die  Islander  im  zehnten  und  eilften  Jahrhundert  (Braun- 
schweig, 1844).  Cf.  E.  G.  Squier’s  Discovery  of  America  by  the  Northmen,  a critical  review  of  the  works 
of  Hcrtnes,  Rafn  and  Beamish  (1849). 

3 Cf.  his  paper  in  the  Quebec  Lit.  and  Hist.  Soc.  Trans.,  1865. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


97 


Amerique,  — fragments  de  Sagas  Islandaises 
traduits pour  la prejni'ere  fois  en  franqais  (Paris, 
1859) — an  extract  from  the  Revue  Orientate  et 
Americaine  (vol.  ii.).1 

Professor  Daniel  Wilson,  of  Toronto,  has  dis- 
cussed the  subject  at  different  times,  and  with 
these  conclusions  : “ With  all  reasonable  doubts 
as  to  the  accuracy  of  details,  there  is  the  strong- 
est probability  in  favor  of  the  authenticity  of  the 
American  Vinland.  . . . The  data  are  the  mere 
vague  allusions  of  a traveller’s  tale,  and  it  is 
indeed  the  most  unsatisfactory  feature  of  the 
sagas  that  the  later  the  voyages  the  more  con- 
fused and  inconsistent  their  narratives  become 
in  every  point  of  detail.”  2 

Dr.  B.  F.  De  Costa’s  first  book  on  the  subject 
was  his  Pre-Columbian  Discovery  of  America  by 
the  Northmen,  illustrated  by  Translations  from 
the  Icelandic  Sagas,  edited  with  notes  and  a gen- 
eral introduction  (Albany,  1868).  It  is  a con- 
venient gathering  of  the  essential  parts  of  the 
sagas  ; but  the  introduction  rather  opposes  than 
disproves  some  of  the  “feeble  paragraphs, 
pointed  with  a sneer,”  which  he  charges  upon 
leading  opponents  of  the  faith.  Professor  J.  L. 
Diman,  in  the  North  American  Review  (July, 
1869),  made  De  Costa’s  book  the  occasion  of  an 
essay  setting  forth  the  grounds  of  a disbelief  in 
the  historical  value  of  the  sagas.  De  Costa 
replied  in  Notes  on  a Review,  etc.  (Charlestown, 

1869) .  In  the  same  year,  Dr.  Kohl,  following 
the  identifications  of  Rafn,  rehearsed  the  narra- 
tives in  his  Discovery  of  Maine  (Portland,  1869), 
and  tracked  Karlsefne  through  the  gulf  of 
Maine.  De  Costa  took  issue  with  him  on  this 
latter  point  in  his  Northmen  in  Maine  (Albany, 

1870) .3  In  the  introduction  to  his  Sailing  Di- 
rections of  Henry  Hudson,  De  Costa  argues  that 
these  mariners’  guides  are  the  same  used  by  the 


Northmen,  and  in  his  Columbus  and  the  Geog- 
raphers of  the  North  (Hartford,  1872,  — cf. 
Amer.  Church  Review,  xxiv.  418)  he  recapitu- 
lates the  sagas  once  more  with  reference  to  the 
knowledge  which  he  supposes  Columbus  to 
have  had  of  them.  Paul  Gaffarel,  in  his  Etudes 
sur  les  rapports  de  l’ Amerique  et  de  lancien 
Continent  avant  Colomb  (Paris,  1869),  entered 
more  particularly  into  the  evidence  of  the  com- 
merce of  Vinland  and  its  relations  to  Europe. 

Gabriel  Gravier,  another  French  author,  was 
rather  too  credulous  in  his  Decouverte  de  V Ame- 
rique par  les  normands  au  Xe  Siecle  ( Paris,  1874), 
when  he  assumed  with  as  much  confidence  as 
Rafn  ever  did  everything  that  the  most  ardent 
advocate  had  sought  to  prove.4 

There  were  two  American  writers  soon  to  fol- 
low, hardly  less  intemperate.  These  were  Aaron 
Goodrich,  in  A History  of  the  Character  and 
Achievements  of  the  so-called  Christopher  Colum- 
bus(N.  Y.,  1874),  who  took  the  full  complement 
of  Rafn’s  belief  with  no  hesitancy ; and  Rasmus 
B.  Anderson  in  his  America  not  discovered  by  Co- 
lumbus (Chicago,  1874;  improved,  1877;  again 
with  Watson’s  bibliography,  18S3),5 6  in  which 
even  the  Skeleton  in  Armor  is  made  to  play  a 
part.  Excluding  such  vagaries,  the  book  is  not 
without  use  as  displaying  the  excessive  views  en- 
tertained in  some  quarters  on  the  subject.  The 
author  is,  we  believe,  a Scandinavian,  and  shows 
the  tendency  of  his  race  to  a facility  rather  than 
felicity  in  accepting  evidence  on  this  subject. 

The  narratives  were  first  detailed  among  our 
leading  general  histories  when  the  Popular 
History  of  the  United  States  of  Bryant  and  Gay 
appeared  in  1876.  The  claims  were  presented 
decidedly,  and  in  the  main  in  the  directions  in- 
dicated by  Rafn  ; but  the  wildest  pretensions  of 
that  antiquary  were  considerately  dismissed. 


1 Beauvois  also  made  at  a later  period  other  contributions  to  the  subject : Les  dcrnicrs  vestiges  du  Chris- 
tianisme  preaches  du  Xe  au  XIVe  sibclcs  dans  le  Markland  et  le  Grandc-Irlande , les  porte-croix  de  la 
Gaspesie  et  de  V Arcadie  (Paris,  1877)  which  appeared  originally  in  the  Annales  de  philosophic  Chrcticnnes, 
Apr.,  1877;  and  Les  Colonics  europcennes  du  Markland  et  de  V Escociland  au  XlVe  sibcle  et  les  vestiges  qui 
en  subsistbrent  jusqu' aux  X V lc  et  XVI A sihcle  (Luxembourg,  1878),  being  taken  from  the  Compte  Rendu 
of  the  Luxembourg  meeting  of  the  Congr&s  des  Americanistes. 

2 Prehistoric  Man,  3d  ed.,  ii.  S3,  85.  Cf.  also  his  Historic  Footprints  in  America,  extracted  from  the 
Canadian  Journal,  Sept.,  1864. 

3 Joseph  Williamson,  in  the  Hist.  Mag.,  Jan.,  1869  (x.  30),  sought  to  connect  with  the  Northmen  certain 
ancient  remains  along  the  coast  of  Maine. 

4 He  was  rather  caustically  taken  to  account  by  Henry  Cabot  Lodge,  in  the  No.  Am.  Review,  vol.  cxix. 
Cf.  Michel  Hardy’s  Les  Scandinaves  dans  l’ Amerique  du  Nord  (Dieppe,  1S74).  An  April  hoax  which 
appeared  in  a Washington  paper  in  1867,  about  some  runes  discovered  on  the  Potomac,  had  been  promptly 
exposed  in  this  country  (Hist.  Mag.,  Mar.  and  Aug.,  1869),  but  it  had  been  accepted  as  true  in  the  Annuaire  de 
la  Socicte  Americaine  in  iS73,and  Gaffarel  (Etudes  sur  les  Rapports  de  /’ Amerique  avant  Columbus,  Paris, 

1869,  p.  251)  and  Gravier  (p.  139)  was  drawn  into  the  snare.  (Cf.  Whittlesey’s  Archaol.  frauds  in  the  West- 
ern Reserve  Hist.  Soc.  Tracts,  no.  9,  and  H.  W.  Haynes  in  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  Jan.,  18S8,  p.  59.)  In  a 
later  monograph,  Les  Normands  sur  la  route  des  Indes  (Rouen,  18S0),  Gravier,  while  still  accepting  the  old 
exploded  geographical  theories,  undertook  further  to  prove  that  the  bruits  of  the  Norse  discoveries  instigated 
the  seamen  of  Normandy  to  similar  ventures,  and  that  they  visited  America  in  ante-Columbian  days. 

6 There  is  an  authorized  German  version,  Die  erste  Entdeckung  von  Amerika,  by  Mathilde  Mann  (Ham- 
burg, 1SS8). 

VOL.  I.  — 7 


98 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


During  the  last  score  years  the  subject  has 
been  often  made  prominent  by  travellers  like 
Kneeland  1 and  Hayes,2  who  have  recapitulated 
the  evidence ; by  lecturers  like  Charles  Kings- 
ley;3 by  monographists  like  Moosmiiller;4 5  by 
the  minor  historians  like  Higginson,8  who  has 
none  of  the  fervor  of  the  inspired  identifiers  of 
localities,  and  Weise,6  who  is  inclined  to  believe 
the  sea-rovers  did  not  even  pass  Davis’s  Straits  ; 
and  by  contributors  to  the  successive  sessions 
of  the  Congres  des  Americanistes  7 and  to  other 
learned  societies.8 

The  question  was  brought  to  a practical  issue 
in  Massachusetts  by  a proposition  raised  — at 
first  in  Wisconsin  — by  the  well-known  musician 
Ole  Bull,  to  erect  in  Boston  a statue  to  Leif 
Ericson.9  The  project,  though  ultimately  car- 
ried out,  was  long  delayed,  and  was  discouraged 
by  members  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical 
Society  on  the  ground  that  no  satisfactory  evi- 
dence existed  to  show  that  any  spot  in  New 
England  had  been  reached  by  the  Northmen.10 
The  sense  of  the  society  was  finally  expressed  in 
the  report  of  their  committee,  Henry  W.  Haynes 
and  Abner  C.  Goodell,  Jr.,  in  language  which 
seems  to  be  the  result  of  the  best  historical  criti- 
cism ; for  it  is  not  a question  of  the  fact  of  discov- 
ery, but  to  decide  how  far  we  can  place  reliance 
on  the  details  of  the  sagas.  There  is  likely  to  re- 
main a difference  of  opinion  on  this  point.  The 


committee  say  : “ There  is  the  same  sort  of  rea- 
son for  believing  in  the  existence  of  Leif  Eric- 
son that  there  is  for  believing  in  the  existence  of 
Agamemnon,  — they  are  both  traditions  accepted 
by  later  writers  ; but  there  is  no  more  reason  for 
regarding  as  true  the  details  related  about  his 
discoveries  than  there  is  for  accepting  as  his- 
toric truth  the  narratives  contained  in  the  Ho- 
meric poems.  It  is  antecedently  probable  that 
the  Northmen  discovered  America  in  the  early 
part  of  the  eleventh  century ; and  this  discovery 
is  confirmed  by  the  same  sort  of  historical  tra- 
dition, not  strong  enough  to  be  called  evidence, 
upon  which  our  belief  in  many  of  the  accepted 
facts  of  history  rests.” 11 

In  running  down  the  history  of  the  literature 
of  the  subject,  the  present  aim  has  been  simply 
to  pick  out  such  contributions  as  have  been  in 
some  way  significant,  and  reference  must  be  made 
to  the  bibliographies  for  a more  perfect  record.12 13 

Irrespective  of  the  natural  probability  of  the 
Northmen  visits  to  the  American  main,  other 
evidence  has  been  often  adduced  to  support  the 
sagas.  This  proof  has  been  linguistic,  ethno- 
logical, physical,  geographical,  and  monumental. 

Nothing  could  be  slenderer  than  the  alleged 
correspondences  of  languages,  and  we  can  see  in 
Horsford’s  Discovery  of  America  by  Northmen  to 
what  a fanciful  extent  a confident  enthusiasm 
can  carry  it.18. 


1 American  in  Iceland  (Boston,  1876). 

2 Land  of  Desolation  (New  York,  1872).  There  is  a French  version  in  the  Tour  du  Monde,  xxvi. 

3 Lectures  delivered  in  America  (Philad.,  1875),  — third  lecture. 

4 Euro  flier  in  Amcrika  vor  Columbus,  nach  Quellen  bearbeitet  von  P.  Oswald  Moosmiiller  (Regensburg, 
1879). 

5 Larger  History  of  the  United  States  (N.  Y.,  1886). 

6 Discoveries  of  America  (N.  Y.,  1884). 

7 Particularly  Beauvois,  already  mentioned,  and  Dr.  E.  Loffler,  on  the  Vinland  Excursions  of  the  Ancient 
Scandinavians,  at  the  Copenhagen  meeting,  Comfte  Rendu  (1883),  p.  64.  Cf.  also  Michel  Hardys  Les 
Scandinaves  dans  V Amerique  du  Nord  an  X • Sibcle  (Dieppe,  1874). 

3 R.  G.  Haliburton,  in  Roy.  Geog.  Soc.  Proc.  (Jan.,  1885) ; Thomas  Morgan,  in  Roy.  Hist.  Soc.  Trans. 
iii.  75. 

9 E.  N.  Horsford’s  Discovery  of  America  by  the  Northmen  (Boston,  1888);  Anderson’s  America  not  d is- 
covered  by  Columbus,  3d  ed.,  p.  30 ; N.  Y.  Nation,  Nov.  17,  1887  ; Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  Mar.,  1888,  p.  223. 

10  Remarks  of  Wm.  Everett  and  Chas.  Deane  in  the  society’s  Proceedings,  May,  1880. 

11  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  Dec.,  1887.  The  most  incautious  linguistic  inferences  and  the  most  uncritical 
cartological  perversions  are  presented  by  Eben  Norton  Horsford  in  his  Discovery  of  America  by  the  North- 
men— address  at  the  unveiling  of  the  statue  of  Leif  Eriksen,  Oct.  29,  1887  (Boston,  1888).  Cf.  Oscar 
Brenner  in  Beilage  zur  Allgemei?ien  Zeitung  (Munich,  Dec.  6,  1888).  A trustful  reliance  upon  the  reputa- 
tions of  those  who  have  in  greater  or  less  degree  accepted  the  details  of  the  sagas  characterizes  a paper  by 
Mrs.  Ole  Bull  in  the  Mag.  of  Amer.  Hist.,  Mar.,  1888.  She  is  naturally  not  inclined  to  make  much  allowance 
for  the  patriotic  zeal  of  the  northern  writers. 

12  The  best  list  is  in  P.  B.  Watson’s  “Bibliog.  of  Pre-Columbian  Discoveries  of  America,”  originally  in  the 
Library  Journal,  vi.  259,  but  more  complete  in  Anderson’s  America  not  discovered  by  Columbus  (3d  ed., 
Chicago,  1883).  Cf.  also  Chavanne’s  Literature  of  the  Polar  Regions , Th.  Solberg’s  Bibliog.  of  Scandinavia, 
in  English,  with  magazine  articles,  in  F.  W.  Horn’s  Hist,  of  the  lit.  of  the  Scandinavian  North  (1S84,  pp. 
413-500).  There  is  a convenient  brief  list  in  Slafter’s  Voyages  of  the  Northmen  (pp.  127-140),  and  a not 
very  well  selected  one  in  Marie  A.  Brown’s  Icelandic  Discoverers.  Poole's  Index  indicates  the  considerable 
amount  of  periodical  discussions.  The  Scandinavian  writers  are  mainly  referred  to  by  Miss  Brown  and  Mrs. 
Bull. 

13  Forster  finds  a corruption  of  Norvegia  (Norway)  in  Norumbega.  Rafn  finds  the  Norse  elements  in  the 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


99 


The  ethnological  traces  are  only  less  shadowy. 
Hugo  Grotius 1 contended  that  the  people  of 
Central  America  were  of  Scandinavian  descent. 
Brasseur  found  remnants  of  Norse  civilization 
in  the  same  region.2  Viollet  le  Due3  discovers 
great  resemblances  in  the  northern  religious 
ceremonials  to  those  described  in  the  Popul 
Vuh.  A general  resemblance  did  not  escape 
the  notice  of  Humboldt.  Gravier4  is  certain 
that  the  Aztec  civilization  is  Norse.5  Chas. 
Godfrey  Leland  claims  that  the  old  Norse  spirit 
pervades  the  myths  and  legends  of  the  Algon- 
kins,  and  that  it  is  impossible  not  to  admit  that 
there  must  have  been  at  one  time  “ extensive  in- 
tercourse between  the  Northmen  and  the  Algon- 


kins  ; ” and  in  proof  he  points  out  resemblances 
between  the  Eddas  and  the  Algonkin  mythol- 
ogy.6 It  is  even  stated  that  the  Micmacs  have 
a tradition  of  a people  called  Chenooks,  who 
in  ships  visited  their  coast  in  the  tenth  century. 

The  physical  and  geographical  evidences  are 
held  to  exist  in  the  correspondences  of  the  coast 
line  to  the  descriptions  of  the  sagas,  including 
the  phenomena  of  the  tides  7 and  the  length  of 
the  summer  day.8  Laing  and  others,  who  make 
no  question  of  the  main  fact,  readily  recognize 
the  too  great  generality  and  contradictions  of 
the  descriptions  to  be  relied  upon.9 

George  Bancroft,  in  showing  his  distrust,  has 
said  that  the  advocates  of  identification  can  no 


words  Massachusetts,  Nauset,  and  Mount  Hope  (Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  viii.  194-198).  The  word  Hole,  used 
as  synonymous  to  harbor  in  various  localities  along  the  Vineyard  Sound,  has  been  called  a relic  of  the  Icelandic 
Holl,  a hill  (Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  June,  1882,  p.  431  ; Jos.  S.  Fay  in  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  xii.  334;  and  in 
Anderson,  America  not  discovered  by  Columbus,  3d  ed.). 

- Brasseur  de  Bourbourg  in  his  Nations  civilisees  du  Mexique,  and  more  emphatically  in  his  Grammaire 
Quichee,  had  indicated  what  he  thought  a northern  incursion  before  Leif,  in  certain  seeming  similarities  to 
the  northern  tongues  of  those  of  Guatemala.  Cf.  also  Nouv.  Annales  des  Voyages,  6th  ser.,  xvi.  263  ; N.  V. 
Tribune,  Nov.  21,  1855  ; Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  iii.  762. 

1 De  origine  gent  item  Americanarum  (1642). 

2 Nouv.  Ann.  des  Voyages,  6th  ser.,  vols.  iii.  and  vi. 

3 In  Charnay’s  Ruincs,  etc.  (Paris,  1867). 

4 Decouverte  de  l' America  par  les  Normands  (Paris,  1864). 

5 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Nat.  Races , v.  115-16,  gives  references  on  the  peopling  of  America  from  the  northwest  of 
Europe. 

6 Trans.  Roy.  Soc.  Lit.,  yds.  1887;  also  printed  separately  as  Mythology,  legends  and  Folk-lore  of  the 
Algonqitins.  Cf.  also  his  Algonquin  Legends  of  New  England  (18S5).  Cf.  D.  G.  Brinton  in  Amer.  Anti- 
quarian,  May,  1885. 

7 Mr.  Mitchell,  of  the  U.  S.  Coast  Survey,  has  attended  to  this  part  of  the  subject,  and  Horsford  (p.  28) 
quotes  his  MS.  He  finds  on  the  Massachusetts  coast  what  he  thinks  a sufficient  correspondence  to  the  de- 
scription of  the  sagas. 

8 So  plain  a matter  as  the  length  of  the  longest  summer  day  would  indubitably  point  to  an  absolute  parallel 
of  latitude  as  determining  the  site  of  Vinland,  if  there  was  no  doubt  in  the  language  of  the  saga.  Unfortu- 
nately there  is  a wide  divergence  of  opinion  in  the  meaning  of  the  words  to  be  depended  upon,  even  among 
Icelandic  scholars;  and  the  later  writers  among  them  assert  that  Rafn  ( Antiq . Amer.  436)  and  Magnusen  in 
interpreting  the  language  to  confirm  their  theory  of  the  Rhode  Island  bays  have  misconceived.  Their  argu- 
ment is  summarized  in  the  French  version  of  Wheaton.  John  M’Caul  translated  Finn  Magnusen’s  “Ancient 
Scandinavian  divisions  of  the  times  of  day,”  in  the  M'emoire  de  la  Soc.  Roy.  des  Antiq.  du  Nord  (1836-37). 
Rask  disputes  Rafn’s  deductions  (Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  xviii.  22).  T orfaeus.  who  is  our  best  commentator 
after  all,  says  it  meant  Newfoundland.  Robertson  put  it  at  58°  north.  Dahlmann  in  his  Forschungen  (vo\.  i.) 
places  it  on  the  coast  of  Labrador.  Horsford  (p.  66)  at  some  length  admits  no  question  that  it  must  have 
been  between  41°  and  430  north.  Cf.  Laing’s  Heitnskringla,  i.  173;  Palfrey’s  New  England,  i.  55;  De 
Costa’s  Pre-Columbian  Disc.,  p.  33  ; Weise’s  Discoveries  of  America,  31 ; and  particularly  Vigfusson  in  his 
English-1 celandic  Dictionary  under  “ Eykt.” 

9 “ The  discovery  of  America,”  says  Laing  ( Heimskringla , i.  154),  “ rests  entirely  upon  documentary  evidence 
which  cannot,  as  in  the  case  of  Greenland,  be  substantiated  by  anything  to  be  discovered  in  America.”  Laing 
and  many  of  the  commentators,  by  some  strange  process  of  reasoning,  have  determined  that  the  proof  of  these 
MS.  records  being  written  before  Columbus’  visit  to  Iceland  in  1477  is  sufficient  to  establish  the  priority  of 
discovery  for  the  Northmen,  as  if  it  was  nothing  in  the  case  that  the  sagas  may  or  may  not  be  good  history; 
and  nothing  that  it  was  the  opinion  entertained  in  Europe  at  that  time  that  Greenland  and  the  more  distant 
lands  were  not  a new  continent,  but  a prolongation  of  Europe  by  the  north.  It  is  curious,  too,  to  observe  that, 
treating  of  events  after  1492,  Laing  is  quite  willing  to  believe  in  any  saga  being  “ filled  up  and  new  invented,” 
but  is  quite  unwilling  to  believe  anything  of  the  kind  as  respects  those  written  anterior  to  1492  ; and  yet  he 
goes  on  to  prove  conclusively  that  the  Flatoyensis  Codex  is  full  of  fable,  as  when  the  saga  man  makes  the 
eider-duck  lay  eggs  where  during  the  same  weeks  the  grapes  ripen  and  intoxicate  when  fresh,  and  the  wheat 
forms  in  the  earl  Laing  nevertheless  rests  his  case  on  the  Flatoyensis  Codex  in  its  most  general  scope,  and 
calls  poets,  but  not  antiquaries,  those  who  attempt  to  make  any  additional  evidence  out  of  imaginary  runes  or 
the  identification  of  places. 


100 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


farther  agree  than  to  place  Vinland  anywhere  The  earliest  to  go  so  far  as  to  establish  to  a 
from  Greenland  to  Africa.1  certainty2  the  sites  of  the  sagas  was  Rafn,  who 


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1 It  must  be  remembered  that  this  divergence  was  not  so  wide  to  the  Northmen  as  it  seems  to  us.  With 
them  the  Atlantic  was  sometimes  held  to  be  a great  basin  that  was  enclasped  from  northwestern  Europe  by  a 
prolongation  of  Scandinavia  into  Greenland,  Helluland,  and  Markland,  and  it  was  a question  if  the  more 
distant  region  of  Vinland  did  not  belong  rather  to  the  corresponding  prolongation  of  Africa  on  the  south. 
Cf.  De  Costa,  Pre-Columbian  Disc.,  108;  Hist.  Mag.,  xiii.  46. 

2 He  wrote  : “ Here  for  the  first  time  will  be  found  indicated  the  precise  spot  where  the  ancient  Northmen 
held  their  intercourse.”  The  committee  of  the  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  objected  to  this  extreme  confidence.  Pro- 
ceedings, ii.  97,  107,  500,  505. 

Note.  — The  above  map  is  a fac-simile  of  one  of  C.  C.  Rafn’s  maps.  Cf.  the  maps  in  Smith,  Beamish 
Gravier,  Slafter,  Preble’s  Amer.  Flag,  etc. 


* Reproduction  of  part  of  the  plate  in  the  Antiquitcites  Americana,  after  a drawing  by  J.  R.  Bartlett.  The 
engravings  of  the  rock  are  numerous  : Mem.  Amcr  Acad.,  iii.  ; the  works  of  Beamish,  J.  T.  Smith,  Gravier, 
Gay,  Higginson,  etc.  ; Laing’s  Heimskringla : the  French  ed.  of  Wheaton;  Hermes'  Entdeckung  von  Ante - 


102 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


placed  them  on  the  coast  of  Massachusetts  and 
Rhode  Island,  wherein  nearly  all  those  have  fol- 
lowed him  who  have  thought  it  worth  while  to 
be  thus  particular  as  to  headland  and  bay. 

In  applying  the  saga  names  they  have,  how- 
ever, by  no  means  agreed,  for  Krossanes  is  with 
some  Point  Alderton,  at  the  entrance  of  Boston 
Harbor,  and  with  others  the  Gurnet  Head ; the 
island  where  honey  dew  was  found  is  Nantucket 
with  Rafn,  and  with  De  Costa  an  insular  region, 
Nauset,  now  under  water  near  the  elbow  of  Cape 
Cod;1  the  Vinland  of  Rafn  is  in  Narragansett 
Bay,  that  of  Dr.  A.  C.  Hamlin  is  at  Merry  Meet- 
ing Bay  on  the  coast  of  Maine,2  and  that  of  Hors- 
ford  is  north  of  Cape  Cod,3  — not  to  mention 
other  disagreements  of  other  disputants. 

We  get  something  more  tangible,  if  not  more 
decisive,  when  we  come  to  the  monumental  evi- 
dences. DeWitt  Clinton  and  Samuel  L.  Mit- 
chell found  little  difficulty  at  one  time  in  making 


many  people  believe  that  the  earthworks  of 
Onondaga  were  Scandinavian.  A pretended 
runic  inscription  on  a stone  said  to  have  been 
found  in  the  Grave  Creek  mound  was  sedulously 
ascribed  to  the  Northmen.4  What  some  have 
called  a runic  inscription  exists  on  a rock  near 
Yarmouth  in  Nova  Scotia,  which  is  interpreted 
“ Hako’s  son  addressed  the  men,”  and  is  sup- 
posed to  commemorate  the  expedition  of  Thor- 
finn  in  A.  D.  1007. b A rock  on  the  little  islet 
of  Menana,  close  to  Monhegan,  on  the  coast  of 
Maine,  and  usually  referred  to  as  the  Monhegan 
Rock,  bears  certain  weather  marks,  and  there 
have  been  those  to  call  them  runes.8  A similar 
claim  is  made  for  a rock  in  the  Merrimac  Val- 
ley.7 Rafn  describes  such  rocks  as  situated  in 
Tiverton  and  Portsmouth  Grove,  R.  I.,  but  the 
markings  were  Indian,  and  when  Dr.  S.  A. 
Green  visited  the  region  in  1868  some  of  them 
had  disappeared.8 


1 De  Costa,  Pre-Col.  Disc.,  29  ; N.  E.  Hist.  Geneal.  Reg.,  xviii.  37;  Gay,  Pop.  Hist.,  i.  41 ; Mass.  Hist. 
Soc.  Coll.,  viii.  72;  Am.  Geog.  Soc.  Journal,  1870,  p.  50;  A/ner.  Naturalist,  Aug.  and  Sept.,  1879. 

2 Am.  Ass.  Adv.  Science,  Proc.  (1856),  ii.  214. 

3 Cf.  paper  on  the  site  of  Vinland  in  Hist.  Mag.,  Feb.,  1874,  p.  94;  Alex.  Farnum’s  Visit  of  the  Northmen 
to  Rhode  Island  (R.  I.  Hist.  Tracts,  no.  2,  1877).  The  statement  of  the  sagas  that  there  was  no  frost  in 
Vinland  and  grass  did  not  wither  in  winter  compels  some  of  the  identifiers  to  resort  to  the  precession  of  the 
equinox  as  accounting  for  changes  of  climate  (Gay’s  Pop.  Hist.,  i.  50). 

4 E.  G.  Squier  in  Ethnological  Journal,  1848  ; Wilson’s  Prehist.  Man,  ii.  98;  Amer.  Ethnol.  Soc.  Trans., 
i.  392  ; Schoolcraft’s  Indian  Tribes,  iv.  118  ; Mem.  de  la  Soc.  royale  des  Antiq.  du  Nord,  1840-44,  p.  127. 

5 Amer.  Philos.  Soc.  Proc.,  May  2,  1884  (by  Henry  Phillips,  Jr.)  ; Numismatic  and  Antiq.  Soc.  of  Philad., 
Proc.,  1884,  p.  17;  Geo.  S.  Brown’s  Yarmouth  (Boston,  1888). 

8 Wilson’s  Prehist.  Man,  ii.  98  ; Amer.  Asso.  Adv.  Science,  Proc.,  1856,  p.  214  ; Seance  annuelle  de  la 
Soc.  des  Antiq.  du  Nord,  May  14,  1859  ; H.  W.  Haynes  in  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  Jan.,  1888,  p.  56.  The 
Monhegan  inscription,  as  examined  by  the  late  C.  W.  Tuttle  and  J.  Wingate  Thornton,  was  held  to  be  natural 
markings  (Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  ii.  308 ; Pulpit  of  the  Revolution,  410).  Charles  Rau  cites  a striking  instance 
of  the  way  in  which  the  lively  imagination  of  Finn  Magnusen  has  misled  him  in  interpreting  weather  cracks  on 
a rock  in  Sweden  (Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  ii.  83). 

7 N.  E.  Hist.  Geneal.  Reg.,  1854,  p.  185. 

8 Antiquitates  Americana,  335?  3 / 1 > 401 1 Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  Oct.,  1S68,  p.  13;  W.  J.  Millers 
Wampanoag  Indians. 


rica ; Schoolcraft’s  Ind.  Tribes , i.  114,  iv.  120;  Drake’s  ed.,  Philad.,  1884,  i.  p.  88  ; the  Copenhagen  Compte 
Rendu,  Congrls  des  Americanistes,  p.  70,  from  a photograph.  The  Hitchcock  Museum  at  Amherst,  Mass., 
had  a cast,  and  one  was  shown  at  the  Albany  meeting  (1836)  of  the  Am.  Asso.  for  the  Adv.  of  Science.  The 
rock  was  conveyed  by  deed  in  1861  to  the  Roy.  Soc.  of  Northern  Antiquaries  (Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Pioc.,  v.  226, 
vi.  252),  but  the  society  subsequently  relinquished  their  title  to  a Boston  committee,  who  charged  itself  with 
the  care  of  the  monument;  but  in  doing  so  the  Danish  antiquaries  disclaimed  all  belief  in  its  runic  chaiacter 
(Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  iii.  236). 

Note.  — The  opposite  plate  is  reduced  from  one  in  the  Antiq.  Americana.  They  show  the  difficulty,  even 
before  later  weathering,  of  different  persons  in  discerning  the  same  things  on  the  rock,  and  in  discriminating  be- 
tween fissures  and  incisions.  Col.  Garrick  Mallery  (4th  Rept.  Bureau  of  Ethnology,  p.  250)  asserts  that  the 
inscription  has  been  “ so  manipulated  that  it  is  difficult  now  to  determine  the  original  details.”  The  drawings 
represented  are  enumerated  in  the  text.  Later  ones  are  numerous.  Rafn  also  gives  that  of  Dr.  Bailies  and 
Mr.  Gooding  in  1790,  and  that  made  for  the  Rhode  Island  Hist.  Society  in  1S30.  The  last  has  perhaps  been 
more  commonly  copied  than  the  others.  Photographs  of  late  years  are  common  ; but  almost  invariably  the 
photographer  has  chalked  what  he  deems  to  be  the  design,  — in  this  they  do  not  agree,  of  course,  in  order 
to  make  lus  picture  clearer.  I think  Schoolcraft  in  making  his  daguerreotype  was  the  first  to  do  this.  The 
most  careful  drawing  made  of  late  years  is  that  by  Professor  Seager  of  the  Naval  Academy,  under  the  direc- 
tion of  Commodore  Blake ; and  there  is  in  the  Cabinet  of  the  American  Antiquarian  Society  a MS.  essay 
on  the  rock,  written  at  Blake’s  request  by  Chaplain  Chas.  R.  Hale  of  the  U.  S.  Navy.  Haven  disputes 
Blake’s  statement  that  a change  in  the  river’s  bed  more  nearly  submerges  the  rock  at  high  tide  than  was 
formerly  the  case.  Cf.  Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  Oct.,  1864,  p.  41,  where  a history  of  the  rock  is  given  ; and  is 
Wilson’s  Prehistoric  Mcni,  ii.  93. 


INSCRIPTION  ON  DIGHTON  ROCK.  (See  p.  102.) 


104 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  most  famous  of  all  these  alleged  memo- 
rials 1 is  the  Dighton  Rock,  lying  in  the  tide  on 
the  side  of  Taunton  River,  in  the  town  of  Berke- 
ley, in  Massachusetts.2  Dr.  De  Costa  thinks  it 
possible  that  the  central  portion  may  be  runic. 
This  part  is  what  has  been  interpreted  to  mean 
that  Thorfinn  with  151  men  took  possession  of 


the  country,  and  it  is  said  to  be  this  portion  of 
the  inscription  which  modern  Indians  discard 
when  giving  their  interpretations.3  That  it  is 
the  work  of  the  Indian  of  historic  times  seems 
now  to  be  the  opinion  common  to  the  best 
trained  archaeologists.4 

Rafn  was  also  the  first  to  proclaim  the  stone 


1 Cf.  list  of  inscribed  rocks  in  the  Proceedings  (vol.  ii.)  of  the  Davenport  Acad,  of  Natural  Sciences. 

2 The  stone  with  its  inscription  early  attracted  attention,  but  Danforth’s  drawing  of  1680  is  the  earliest 
known.  Cotton  Mather,  in  a dedicatory  epistle  to  Sir  Henry  Ashurst,  prefixed  to  his  Wonderful  Works  of 
God  comme?norated  (Boston,  1690),  gave  a cut  of  a part  of  the  inscription ; and  he  communicated  an  account 
with  a drawing  of  the  inscription  to  the  Royal  Society  in  1712,  which  appears  in  their  Philosophical  Trans- 
actions. Dr.  Isaac  Greenwood  sent  another  draft  to  the  Society  of  Antiquaries  in  London  in  1730,  and 
their  Transactions  in  1732  has  this  of  Greenwood.  In  1768  Professor  Stephen  Sewall  of  Cambridge  made 
a copy  of  the  natural  size,  which  was  sent  in  1774  by  Professor  James  Winthrop  to  the  Royal  Society. 
Dr.  Stiles  says  that  Sewall  sent  it  to  Gebelin,  of  the  French  Academy,  whose  members  judged  them  to 
be  Punic  characters.  Stiles  himself,  in  1783,  in  an  election  sermon  delivered  at  Hartford,  spoke  of  “the 
visit  by  the  Phoenicians,  who  charged  the  Dighton  Rock  and  other  rocks  in  Narragansett  Bay  with  Punic 
inscriptions  remaining  to  this  day,  which  last  I myself  have  repeatedly  seen  and  taken  off  at  large.”  Cf. 
Thornton’s  Pulpit  of  the  Revolution , p.  410.  The  Archceologia  (London,  viii.  for  1786)  gave  various  drawings, 
with  a paper  by  the  Rev.  Michael  Lort  and  some  notes  by  Charles  Vallancey,  in  which  the  opinion  was 
expressed  that  the  inscription  was  the  work  of  a people  from  Siberia,  driven  south  by  hordes  of  Tartars. 
Professor  Winthrop  in  1788  filled  the  marks,  as  he  understood  them,  with  printer’s  ink,  and  in  this  way  took 
an  actual  impression  of  the  inscription.  His  copy  was  engraved  in  the  Memoirs  of  the  American  Academy 
of  Arts  and  Sciences  (vol.  ii.  for  1793).  It  was  this  copy  by  Winthrop  which  Washington  in  1789  saw  at 
Cambridge,  when  he  pronounced  the  inscription  as  similar  to  those  made  by  the  Indians,  which  he  had  been 
accustomed  to  see  in  the  western  country  during  his  life  as  a surveyor.  Cf.  Belknap  Papers,  Mass.  Hist.  Soc. 
Coll.,  ii.  76,  77, 81 ; Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  x.  1x4.  In  1789  there  was  also  presented  to  the  Academy  a copy 
made  by  Joseph  Gooding  under  the  direction  of  Francis  Baylies  ( Belknap  Papers,  ii.  160).  In  the  third 
volume  of  the  Academy’s  Memoirs  there  are  papers  on  the  inscription  by  John  Davis  and  Edward  A.  Kendall ; 
Davis  (1807)  thinking  it  a representation  of  an  Indian  deer  hunt,  and  Kendall  later,  in  his  Travels  (vol.  ii. 
1800),  assigns  it  to  the  Indians.  This  description  is  copied  in  Barber’s  Historical  Collections  of  Mass.  (p. 
1x7).  In  1812  a drawing  was  made  by  Job  Gardner,  and  in  1825  there  was  further  discussion  in  theMemoires 
de  la  Societe  de  Geographic  de  Paris,  and  in  the  Hist,  of  New  York  by  Yates  and  Moulton.  In  1831  there 
was  a cut  in  Ira  Hill’s  Antiquities  of  America  explained  (Hagerstown,  Md.)  This  was  in  effect  the  history 
of  the  interest  in  the  rock  up  to  the  appearance  of  Rafn’s  Antiquitates  Americana , in  which  for  the  fiist  time 
the  inscription  was  represented  as  being  the  work  of  the  Northmen.  This  belief  is  now  shaied  by  few,  if 
any,  temperate  students.  The  exuberant  Anderson  thinks  that  the  rock  removes  all  doubt  of  the  Noithmen 
discovery  ( America  not  discovered  by  Columbus,  pp.  21,  23,  83).  The  credulous  Gravier  has  not  a doubt. 
Cf.  his  Notice  sur  le  roc  de  Dighton  et  le  sejour  des  Scandmaves  en  Amerique  an  commencement  du 
XIC  sibcle  (Nancy,  1875),  reprinted  from  the  Compte  Rendu,  Congres  des  Americanistes,  i.  166,  giving  Rafn  s 
drawing.  The  Rev.  J.  P.  Bodfish  accepts  its  evidence  in  the  Proc.  Second  Pub.  Meeting  U.  S.  Cath.  Hist. 
Soc.  (N.  Y.,  1886). 

3 Pre-Columbian  Discovery  of  America , p.  lvii.  The  Brinley  Catalogue,  iii.  537^:  gives  Dammartin  s Ex- 
plification  de  la pierre  de  Taunston  (Paris  ? 1840-50)  as  finding  in  the  inscription  an  astronomical  theme  by 
some  nation  foreign  to  America.  Buckingham  Smith  believed  it  to  be  a Roman  Catholic  invocation,  around 
which  the  Indians  later  put  their  symbols  ( Amer . Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  Apr.  29,  1863,  p.  32).  For  discussions 
more  or  less  extensive  see  Laing’s  Heimskringla,  i.  175  > Haven  in  Smithsonian  Contributions,  1856,  viii. 
133,  in  a paper  on  the  “ Archaeology  of  the  United  States  Charles  Rau  in  Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  Feb.,  1S7S  , 
Apr.,  1879;  and  in  Amer.  Antiquarian,  i.  38;  Daniel  Wilson’s  Prehistoric  Man,  ii.  97 ! J.  R.  Baitlett  in 
Rhode  Island  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  1872-73,  p.  70;  Haven  and  others  in  Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  Oct.,  1864,  and 
Oct.,  1867  ; H.  H.  Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  v.  74  ; Drake’s  N.  E.  Coast  ; North  American  Rev.,  1874  ; Amer. 
Biblical  Repository,  July,  1839:  Historical  Mag.,  Dec.,  1859,  and  March,  1869;  Lelewel  s Moyen  Age,  iii. , 
H.  W.  Williams’s  transl.  of  Humboldt’s  Travels,  i.  157,  etc. 

4 Schoolcraft  wavered  in  his  opinion.  (Cf.  Haven,  133.)  He  showed  Gooding’s  drawing  to  an  Algonkin 
chief,  who  found  in  it  a record  of  a battle  of  the  Indians,  except  that  some  figures  near  the  centre  did  not 
belong  to  it,  and  these  Schoolcraft  thought  might  be  runic,  as  De  Costa  has  later  suggested;  but  in  1853 
Schoolcraft  made  no  reservation  in  pronouncing  it  entirely  Indian  ( Indian  Tribes , i.  112;  iv.  120;  pi.  14)- 
Wilson  ( Prehist . Man,  ii.,  ch.  19)  is  severe  on  Schoolcraft.  On  the  general  character  of  Indian  rock 
inscriptions,  — some  of  which  in  the  delineations  accompanying  these  accounts  closely  resemble  the  Dighton 
Rock,  — see  Mallery  in  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology,  Fourth  Report , p.  19;  Lieut.  A.  M.  Wheeler’s  Report  on 
Indian  tribes  in  Pacific  Rail  Road  Reports,  ii. ; J . G.  Bruff  on  those  of  Green  River  in  the  Sierra  Nevada,  in 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


105 


tower  now  standing  at  Newport,  R.  I.,  as  a work 
of  the  Northmen  ; but  the  recent  antiquaries 
without  any  exception  worth  considering,  be- 
lieve that  the  investigations  have  shown  that 
it  was  erected  by  Governor  Arnold  of  Rhode 
Island  as  a windmill,  sometime  between  1670 
and  1680  ; and  Palfrey  in  his  New  England  is 
thought  to  have  put  this  view  beyond  doubt  in 
showing  the  close  correspondence  in  design  of 
the  tower  to  a mill  at  Chesterton,  in  England.1 

Certain  hearthstones  which  were  discovered 
over  twenty-five  years  ago  under  a peat  bed  on 
Cape  Cod  were  held  at  the  time  to  be  a Norse 
relic.2  In  1831  there  was  exhumed  in  Fall  River, 
Mass.,  a skeleton,  which  had  with  it  what  seemed 
to  be  an  ornamental  belt  made  of  metal  tubes, 
formed  by  rolling  fragments  of  flat  brass  and  an 
oblong  plate  of  the  same  metal,  — not  of  bronze; 
as  is  usually  said, — with  some  arrow-heads,  cut 
evidently  from  the  same  material.  The  other 
concomitants  of  the  burial  indicated  an  Indian 
of  the  days  since  the  English  contact.  The  skel- 
eton attracted  notice  in  this  country  by  being 
connected  with  the  Norsemen  in  Longfellow’s 
ballad,  The  Skeleton  in  Armor,  and  Dr.  Webb 


sent  such  an  account  of  it  to  the  Royal  Society 
of  Northern  Antiquaries  that  it  was  looked  upon 
as  another  and  distinct  proof  of  the  identifica- 
tion of  Vinland.  Later  antiquaries  have  dis- 
missed all  beliefs  of  that  nature.3 

There  is  not  a single  item  of  all  the  evidence 
thus  advanced  from  time  to  time  which  can  be 
said  to  connect  by  archaeological  traces  the 
presence  of  the  Northmen  on  the  soil  of  North 
America  south  of  Davis’  Straits.  Arguments 
of  this  kind  have  been  abandoned  except  by  a 
few  enthusiastic  advocates. 

That  the  Northmen  voyaging  to  Vinland  en- 
countered natives,  and  that  they  were  called 
Skraelings,  may  be  taken  as  a sufficiently  broad 
statement  in  the  sagas  to  be  classed  with  those 
concomitants  of  the  voyages  which  it  is  reason- 
able to  accept.  Sir  William  Dawson  (Fossil 
Men,  49)  finds  it  easy  to  believe  that  these  na- 
tives were  our  red  Indians  ; and  Gallatin  saw 
no  reason  to  dissociate  the  Eskimos  with  other 
American  tribes.4  That  they  were  Eskimos 
seems  to  be  the  more  commonly  accepted 
view.5 


Smithsonian  Rcpt.  (1872);  American  Antiquarian,  iv.259;vi.  119;  Western  Reserve  Hist.  Soc.  Tracts, 
nos.  42,  44,  52,  53,  56;  T.  Ewbank’s  No.  Amer.  Rock  Writing  (Morrisania,  1866);  Brinton’s  Myths  of  the 
New  World,  p.  10 ; Tylor’s  Early  Hist.  Mankind ; Dr.  Richard  Andree’s  Ethnographische  Parallelen  mid 
Vergleiche  ( Stuttgard,  1878).  It  is  Mallery’s  opinion  that  no  “considerable  information  of  value  in  an  his- 
torical point  of  view  will  be  obtained  directly  from  the  interpretations  of  the  Pictographs  in  North  America.” 

1 Palfrey,  i.  p.  57;  Higginson’s  Larger  Hist.,  44;  Gay’s  Pop.  Hist.,  i.  59,  60;  Laing’s  Hcimskringla,  i. 
183;  Charles  T.  Brooks’s  Controversy  touching  the  old  stone  mill  in  Newport  (Newport,  1S51);  Peterson’s 
Rhode  Island ; Drake’s  New  England  Coast ; Schoolcraft’s  Indian  Tribes,  iv.  120;  Bishop’s  Amcr.  Manu- 
factures, i.  1 18  ; C.  S.  Pierce  in  Science,  iv.  512,  who  endeavored  by  measurement  to  get  at  what  was  the  unit 
of  measure  used,  — an  effort  not  very  successful.  Cf.  references  in  Poole's  Index,  p.  913. 

Gaffarel  accepts  the  Rafn  view  in  his  Etudes  sur  la  rapports,  etc.,  2S2,  as  does  Gravier  in  his  Normands 
sur  la  route , p.  168  ; and  De  Costa  ( Pre-Columbian  Disc.,  p.  Iviii)  intimates  that  “ all  is  in  a measure  doubt- 
ful.” R.  G.  Hatfield  ( Scribner's  Monthly,  Mar.,  1879)  >n  an  illustrated  paper  undertook  to  show  by  com- 
parison with  Scandinavian  building  that  what  is  now  standing  is  but  the  central  part  of  a Vinland  baptistery, 
and  that  the  projection  which  supported  the  radiating  roof  timbers  is  still  to  be  seen.  This  paper  was 
answered  by  George  C.  Mason  (Mag.  Amer.  Hist.,  iii.  541,  Sept.,  1S79,  with  other  remarks  in  the  Amer: 
Architect,  Oct.  4,  1S79),  who  rehearsed  the  views  of  the  local  antiquaries  as  to  its  connection  with  Gov. 
Arnold.  Cf.  Reminiscences  of  Ncioport,  by  Geo.  C.  Mason,  1SS4. 

2 Hist.  Mag.,  Apr.,  1S62,  p.  123;  N.  E.  Hist.  Geneal.  Reg.,  1865,  p.  372;  Abner  Morse’s  Traces  of  the 
Ancient  Northmen  in  America  (Aug.,  1S61),  with  a Supplement  ( Boston,  1SS7). 

3 Mcmoires  de  la  Soc.  roy.  des  Antiq.du  Nord,  1S43  i New  Jersey  Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  vi.  ; Stone’s  Brant , ii. 
593-94  ; Schoolcraft’s  Ind.  Tribes,  i.  127 ; Smithsonian  Rcpt.,  18S3,  p.  902  ; Dr.  Kneeland  in  Peabody  Mus. 
Repts.,  no.  20,  p.  543.  The  skeleton  was  destroyed  by  fire  about  1843. 

4 Dawkins  in  his  Cave  Hunters  accounts  them  survivors  of  the  cave  dwellers  of  Europe.  Cf.  Wilson’s 
Prehistoric  Man.  A.  R.  Grote  (Amer.  Naturalist,  Apr.,  1S77)  holds  them  to  be  the  survivors  of  the  palaeo- 
lithic man. 

5 E.  Beauvois’  Les  Skroclings,  Ancctres  des  Esquimaux  (Paris,  1S79)  > B.  F.  DeCosta  in  Pop.  Science 
Monthly,  Nov.,  1884;  A.  S.  Packard  on  their  former  range  southward,  in  the  American  Naturalist,  xix.  471, 
553,  and  his  paper  on  the  Eskimos  of  Labrador,  in  Appleton's  Journal,  Dec.  9,  1871  (reprinted  in  Beach’s 
Indian  Miscellany,  Albany,  1S77).  Humboldt  holds  them  to  have  been  driven  across  America  to  Europe 
(Views  of  Nature,  Bohn’s  ed.,  123).  Ethnologists  are  not  wholly  agreed  as  to  the  course  of  their  migrations. 
The  material  for  the  ethnological  study  of  the  Eskimos  must  be  looked  for  in  the  narratives  of  the  Arctic 
voyagers,  like  Scoresby,  Parry,  Ross,  O’Reilly,  Kane,  C.  F.  Hall,  and  the  rest ; in  the  accounts  by  the  mission- 
aries like  Egede,  Crantz,  and  others  ; by  students  of  ethnology,  like  Lubbock  (Prehist.  Times,  ch.  14) ; Prichard 
( Researches , v.  367) ; Waitz  ( Amerikaner , i.  300) ; the  Abbe  Morillot  (Mythologie  et  legendes  des  Esquimaux 
du  Groenland  in  th eActes  de  la  Soc.  Philologique  (Paris,  1S75),  vol.  iv.)  ; Morgan  (Systems  of  Consanguinity , 


io6 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


That  the  climate  of  the  Atlantic  coast  of  the 
United  States  and  the  British  provinces  was 
such  as  was  favorable  to  the  present  Arctic 
dwellers  is  held  to  be  shown  by  such  evidences 
as  tusks  of  the  walrus  found  in  phosphate  beds 
in  South  Carolina.  Rude  implements  found  in 
the  interglacial  Jersey  drift  have  been  held  by 
C.  C.  Abbott  to  have  been  associated  with  a 
people  of  the  Eskimo  stock,  and  some  have 
noted  that  palaeolithic  implements  found  in 
Pennsylvania  closely  resemble  the  work  of  the 
modern  Eskimos  ( Amer . Antiquarian , i.  to).1 
Dali  remarks  upon  implements  of  Innuit  origin 


being  found  four  hundred  miles  south  of  the 
present  range  of  the  Eskimos  of  the  northwest 
coast  ( Contributions  to  Amer.  Ethnology,  i.  p.  98). 
Charlevoix  says  that  Eskimos  were  occasionally 
seen  in  Newfoundland  in  the  beginning  of  the 
last  century ; and  ethnologists  recognize  to-day 
the  same  stock  in  the  Eskimos  of  Labrador  and 
Greenland. 

The  best  authority  on  the  Eskimos  is  generally 
held  to  be  Hinrich  Rink,  and  he  contends  that- 
they  formerly  occupied  the  interior  of  the  con- 
tinent, and  have  been  pressed  north  and  across 
Behring’s  Straits.2  W.  H.  Dali  holds  similar 


HENRIK  RINK* 


267),  who  excludes  them  from  his  Ganowanian  family  ; Irving  C.  Rosse  on  the  northern  inhabitants  (. Journal 
Amer.  Geog.  Soc.,  1883,  p.  163)  ; Ludwig  Kumlien  in  his  Contributions  to  the  natural  history  of  Arctic 
America,  made  in  connection  with  the  Howgate  polar  expedition,  1877-78,  in  Bull,  of  the  U.  S.  Naval 
Museum  (Washington,  1879),  no.  15;  and  his  paper  in  the  Smithsonian  Report  (1878).  There  are  several 
helpful  papers  in  the  Journal  of  the  Anthropological  Institute  (London),  vol.  i.,  by  Richard  King,  on  their 
intellectual  character;  vol.  iv.  by  P.  C.  Sutherland;  vol.  vii.  by  John  Rae  on  their  migrations,  and  W.  H. 
Flower  on  their  skulls ; vol.  ix.  by  W.  J.  Sollars  on  their  bone  implements.  For  other  references  see  Bancroft, 
Native  Races,  i.  41,  138;  Poole's  Index,  p.  424,  and  Supplement,  p.  146. 

1 This  evidence  is  of  course  rather  indicative  of  a geological  antiquity  not  to  be  associated  with  the  age  of 
the  Northmen.  Of.  Murray's  Distribution  of  Animals,  128  ; Howarth's  Mammoth  and  Flood,  2S5. 

2 Rink,  born  in  1819  in  Copenhagen,  spent  much  of  the  interval  from  1853  to  1872  in  Greenland.  Pilling 
(Bibl.  Eskimo  Language , p.  So)  gives  the  best  account  of  Rink’s  publications.  His  principal  book  is  Gronland 

* After  a likeness  given  by  Nordenskjold  in  his  Exped.  till  Gronland , p.  121. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


107 


views.1  C.  R.  Markham,  who  dates  their  first 
appearance  in  Greenland  in  1349,  contends,  on 
the  other  hand,  that  they  came  from  the  west 
(Siberia)  along  the  polar  regions  (Wrangell 
Land),  and  drove  out  the  Norse  settlers  in  Green- 
land.2 The  most  active  of  the  later  students  of 
the  Eskimos  is  Dr.  Franz  Boas,  now  of  New 
York,  who  has  discussed  their  tribal  boundaries.3 

* F.  The  Lost  Greenland  Colonies.  — 
After  intercourse  with  the  colonies  in  Greenland 
ceased,  and  definite  tradition  in  Iceland  had  died 
out,  and  when  the  question  of  the  re-discovery 
should  arise,  it  was  natural  that  attention 
should  first  be  turned  to  that  coast  of  Green- 
land which  lay  opposite  Iceland  as  the  likelier 
sites  of  the  lost  colonies,  and  in  this  way  we  find 
all  the  settlements  placed  in  the  maps  of  the 
sixteenth  century.  The  Archbishop  Erik  Wal- 
kendorf,  of  Lund,  in  the  early  part  of  that  cen- 
tury had  failed  to  persuade  the  Danish  govern- 
ment to  send  an  expedition.  King  Frederick  II 
was  induced,  however,  to  send  one  in  1568;  but 
it  accomplished  nothing;  and  again  in  1579  he 
put  another  in  command  of  an  Englishman, 
Jacob  Allday,  but  the  ice  prevented  his  landing. 
A Danish  navigator  was  more  successful  in 
1581 ; but  the  coast  opposite  Iceland  yielded  as 
yet  no  traces  of  the  Norse  settlers.  Frobisher’s 
discovery  of  the  west  coast  seems  to  have  failed 


of  recognition  among  the  Danes  ; but  they  with 
the  rest  of  Europe  did  not  escape  noting  the  im- 
portance of  the  explorations  of  John  Davis  in 
1 585-86,  through  the  straits  which  bear  his  name. 
It  now  became  the  belief  that  the  west  settle- 
ment must  be  beyond  Cape  Farewell.  In  1605, 
Christian  IV  of  Denmark  sent  a new  expe- 
dition under  Godske  Lindenow;  but  there  was 
a Scotchman  in  command  of  one  of  the  three 
ships,  and  Jacob  Hall,  who  had  probably  served 
under  Davis,  went  as  the  fleet  pilot.  He  guided 
the  vessels  through  Davis’s  Straits.  But  it  was 
rather  the  purpose  of  Lindenow  to  find  a north- 
west passage  than  to  discover  a lost  colony ; 
and  such  was  mainly  the  object  which  impelled 
him  again  in  1606,  and  inspired  Karsten  Rikard- 
sen  in  1607.  Now  and  for  some  years  to  come 
we  have  the  records  of  voyages  made  by  the 
whalers  to  this  region,  and  we  read  their  narra- 
tives in  Purchas  and  in  such  collections  of  voy- 
ages as  those  of  Harris  and  Churchill.4  They 
yield  us,  however,  little  or  no  help  in  the  prob- 
lem we  are  discussing.  In  1670  and  1671  Chris- 
tian V sent  expeditions  with  the  express  purpose 
of  discovering  the  lost  colonies  ; but  Otto  Ax- 
elsen,  who  commanded,  never  returned  from  his 
second  voyage,  and  we  have  no  account  of  his 
first. 

The  mission  of  the  priest  Hans  Egede  gave 
the  first  real  glimmer  of  light.5  He  was  the 


geographisch  u>id  statistisch  beschriebcn  (Stuttgart,  i860).  The  English  reader  has  access  to  his  Tales  and 
Traditions  of  the  Eskimo , translated  by  Rink  himself,  and  edited  by  Dr.  Robert  Brown  (London,  1875)  ; to 
Danish  Greenland , its  people  and  its  products , ed.  by  Dr.  Brown  (London,  1S77).  Rink  says  of  this  work 
that  in  its  English  dress  it  must  be  considered  a new  book.  He  also  published  The  Eskimo  tribes ; their 
distribution  and  characteristics , especially  in  regard  to  language.  With  a comparative  vocabulary  (Co- 
penhagen, etc.,  1887).  He  also  considered  their  dialects  as  divulging  the  relationship  of  tribes  in  the  Journal 
of  the  Anthropological  Institute  (xv.  239) ; and  in  the  same  journal  (1872,  p.  104)  he  has  written  of  their  descent. 
Rink  also  furnished  to  the  Comptc  Rendu , Congrls  des  Americanistcs,  a paper  on  the  traditions  of  Greenland 
(Nancy,  1875,  181),  and  (Luxembourg,  1S77,  ii.  327)  another  on  “ L’habitat  primitif  des  Esquimaux.” 

Dr.  Brown  has  also  considered  the  “ Origin  of  the  Eskimo  ” in  the  Archtzological  Review  (18S8),  no.  4. 

1 Alaska  and  its  Resources,  p.  374  ; and  in  Contributions  to  Amcr.  Ethnology,  i.  93. 

2 “On  the  origin  and  migrations  of  the  Greenland  Esquimaux”  in  the  Journal  Royal  Geog.  Soc.,  1865; 
“The  Arctic  highlanders”  in  the  Lond.  Ethnol.  Soc.  Trans.  (1S66),  iv.  125,  and  in  Arctic  Geography  and 
Ethnology  (London,  1875),  published  by  the  Royal  Geog.  Society. 

8 American  Antiquarian,  Jan.,  1S88.  Cf.  other  papers  by  him  in  the  Proc.  Roy.  Soc.  of  Canada,  vol.  v. 
“A  year  among  the  Eskimos”  in  the  Journal  Amcr.  Geog.  Soc.,  18S7,  xix.  p.  383;  “ Reise  in  Baffinland” 
in  the  proceedings  of  the  Berlin  Gesellschaft  fur  Erdkunde  (1S85).  Cf.  Pilling’s  Eskimo  Bibliog.,  p.  12  ; and 
for  linguistic  evidences  of  tribal  differences,  pp.  69-72,  S1-S2.  Cf.  also  H.  H.  Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  iii. 
574,  and  Lucien  Adam’s  “ En  quoi  la  langue  Esquimaude,  defffere-t-elle  grammaticalement  des  autres  langues 
de  l’Amerique  du  Nord?  ” in  the  Compte  Rendu,  Congrls  des  Amer.  (Copenhagen),  p.  337. 

Anton  von  Etzel’s  Gronland,  geographisch  und  statistisch  beschriebcn  aus  Ddnischcn  Quellschriften 
(Stuttgart,  i860)  goes  cursorily  over  the  early  history,  and  describes  the  Eskimos.  Cf.  F.  Schwatka  in  Amer. 
Magazine,  Aug.,  1S88. 

4 There  is  an  easy  way  of  tracing  these  accounts  in  Joel  A.  Allen’s  List  of  Works  and  Papers  relating  to 
the  mammalian  orders  of  Ccte  and  Sircnia,  extracted  from  the  Bulletin  of  Hayden's  U.  S.  Geol.  and  Geog. 
Survey  (Washington,  1SS2).  It  is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind  that  Spitzbergen  is  often  called  Greenland  in 
these  accounts. 

5 His  book,  Dct  gamlc  Gronlands  nye  Perlustration,  etc.,  was  first  published  at  Copenhagen  in  1729. 
Pilling  ( Bibliog . of  the  Eskimo  language,  p.  26)  was  able  to  find  only  a single  copy  of  this  book,  that  in  the 
British  Museum.  Muller  ( Books  on  America,  Amsterdam,  1S72,  no.  648)  describes  a copy.  This  first  edition 
escaped  the  notice  of  J.  A.  Allen,  whose  list  is  very  carefully  prepared  (nos.  217,  220,  226,  230,  235).  There 


io8 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


earliest  to  describe  the  ruins  and  relics  observ- 
able on  the  west  coast,  but  he  continued  to  re- 
gard the  east  settlements  as  belonging  to  the 
east  coast,  and  so  placed  them  on  the  map. 
Anderson  (Hamburg,  1746)  went  so  far  as  to 
place  on  his  map  the  cathedral  of  Gardar  in  a 
fixed  location  on  the  east  coast,  and  his  map 
was  variously  copied  in  the  following  years. 

In  1786  an  expedition  left  Copenhagen  to  ex- 
plore the  east  coast  for  traces  of  the  colonies, 
but  the  ice  prevented  the  approach  to  the  coast, 


and  after  attempts  in  that  year  and  in  1787  the 
effort  was  abandoned.  Heinrich  Peter  von  Eg- 
gers,  in  his  Om  Gronlands  iisterbygds  sande  Belig- 
genhed  (1792),  and  Ueber  die  -w  a lire  Lage  des 
alien  Ostgroulands  (Kiel,  1794),  a German  trans- 
lation, first  advanced  the  opinion  that  the  east- 
ern colony  as  well  as  the  western  must  have 
been  on  the  west  coast,  and  his  views  were 
generally  accepted ; but  Wormskjold  in  the 
Skandinavisk  Litteraturselskab' s Skrifter , vol.  x. 
(Copenhagen,  1814),  still  adhered  to  the  earlier 


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REDUCED  FAC-SIMILE. 

[Harvard  College  Library  copy.] 


were  two  German  editions  of  this  original  form  of  the  book,  Frankfort,  1730,  and  Hamburg,  1740,  according 
to  the  Carter-Brown  Catalogue  (ii.  448,  647),  but  Pilling  gives  only  the  first.  The  1729  edition  was  enlarged 
in  the  Copenhagen  edition  of  1741,  which  has  a map,  “Gronlandia  Antiqua,”  showing  the  east  colony  and 
west  colony,  respectively,  east  and  west  of  Cape  Farewell.  This  edition  is  the  basis  of  the  various  transla- 
tions: In  German,  Copenhagen,  1742,  using  the  plates  of  the  1741  ed. ; Berlin,  1763.  In  Dutch,  Delft,  1746. 

In  French,  Copenhagen,  1763.  In  English,  London,  1745 ; abstracted  in  the  Philosoph.  Transactions  Royal 
Soc.  (1744),  xlii.  no.  47  ; and  again,  London  (1818),  with  an  historical  introduction  based  on  Torfasus  and  La 
Peyrere.  Crantz  epitomizes  Egede’s  career  in  Greenland. 

The  bibliography  in  Sabin’s  Dictionary  (vi.  22,018,  etc.)  confounds  the  Greenland  journal  (1770-78)0!  Hans 
Egede’s  grandson,  Hans  Egede  Saabye  (b.  1746;  d.  1817),  with  the  work  of  the  grandfather.  This  journal  is 
of  importance  as  regards  the  Eskimos  and  the  missions  among  them.  There  is  an  English  version  : Green- 
land: extracts  from  a journal  kept  in  1770  to  1778.  Prefixed  an  introduction  ; Ulus,  by  chart  of  Green- 
land., by  G.  Fries.  Transl.  from  the  German  [by  H.  E.  Lloyd\  (London,  1818).  The  map  follows  that  of 
the  son  of  Hans,  Paul  Egede,  whose  Nachrichten  von  Gronland  aus  einem  Tagebuche  von  Bischof  Paul 
Egede  (Copenhagen,  1790)  must  also  be  kept  distinct.  Pilling’s  Bibliog.  of  the  Eskimo  language  affords  the 
best  guide. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


IO9 


opinions,  and  Saabye  still  believed  it  possible  to 
reach  the  east  coast. 

Some  years  later  (1828-31)  W.  A.  Graah  made, 
by  order  of  the  king  of  Denmark,  a thorough 
examination  of  the  east  coast,  and  in  his  Under- 
sogelses  Reise  til  Ostkysten  af  Gr (inland  (Copen- 
hagen, 1832)1  he  was  generally  thought  to  estab- 
lish the  great  improbability  of  any  traces  of  a 
colony  ever  existing  on  that  coast.  Of  late  years 
Graah’s  conclusions  have  been  questioned,  for 
there  have  been  some  sites  of  buildings  discovered 
on  the  east  side.2  The  Reverend  J.  Brodbeck, 
a missionary,  described  some  in  The  Moravian 
Quarterly , July  and  Aug.,  1882.  Nordenskjold 
has  held  that  when  the  east  coast  is  explored 
from  65°  td  69°,  there  is  a chance  of  discovering 
the  site  of  an  east  colony.3 

R.  H.  Major,  in  a paper  ( Journal  Roy.  Geog. 
Soc.,  1873,  P-  ^4)  on  the  site  of  the  lost  colony, 
questioned  Graah’s  conclusions,  and  gave  a 
sketch  map,  in  which  he  placed  its  site  near  Cape 
Farewell;  and  he  based  his  geographical  data 
largely  upon  the  chorography  of  Greenland  and 
the  sailing  directions  of  Ivan  Bardsen,  who  was 
probably  an  Icelander  living  in  Greenland  some 
time  in  the  fifteenth  century.4 


G.  Madoc  and  the  Welsh.  — Respecting 
the  legends  of  Madoc,  there  are  reports,  which 
Humboldt  ( Cosmos , Bohn,  ii.  610)  failed  to  ve- 
rify, of  Welsh  bards  rehearsing  the  story  before 
1492, 5 and  of  statements  in  the  early  Welsh 
annals.  The  original  printed  source  is  in  Hum- 
frey  Lloyd’s  History  of  Cambria,  now  called 
Wales,  writteti  iti  the  British  language  [by  Cara- 
doc]  about  200  years  past  (London,  1584). 6 
The  book  contained  corrections  and  additions 
by  David  Powell,  and  it  was  in  these  that  the 
passages  of  importance  were  found,  and  the 
supposition  was  that  the  land  visited  lay  near 
the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  Richard  Hakluyt,  in  his 
Principall  Navigations,  took  the  story  from 
Powell,  and  connected  the  discovery  with  Mexi- 
co in  his  edition  of  1589,  and  with  the  West 
Indies  in  that  of  1600  (iii.  p.  1),  — and  there  was 
not  an  entire  absence  of  the  suspicion  that  it 
was  worth  while  to  establish  some  sort  of  a 
British  claim  to  antedate  the  Spanish  one  estab- 
lished through  Columbus.7 

The  linguistic  evidences  were  not  brought 
into  prominence  till  after  one  Morgan  Jones  had 
fallen  among  the  Tuscaroras8  in  1660,  and 
found,  as  he  asserted,  that  they  could  under- 


1 An  English  translation  by  Macdougall  was  published  in  London  in  1837  (Pilling,  p.  38;  Field,  no.  619). 
A French  version  of  Graah’s  introduction  with  notes  by  M.  de  la  Roquette  was  published  in  1S35.  Cf. 
Journal  Royal  Geog.  Soc.,  i.  247.  After  Graah’s  publication  Rafn  placed  the  Osterbygden  on  the  west  coast 
in  his  map.  Graah’s  report  (1830)  is  in  French  in  the  Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Geog.  de  Paris,  1830. 

2 On  the  present  scant,  if  not  absence  of,  population  on  the  east  coast  of  Greenland,  see  J.  D.  Whitney’s 
Climatic  Changes  of  later  geological  times  ( Mus . of  Comp.  Zool.  Mem.,  vii.  p.  303,  Cambridge,  1S82). 

3 The  changes  in  opinion  respecting  the  sites  of  the  colonies  and  the  successive  explorations  are  followed 
in  the  Comptc  Rendu,  Congrls  des  Americanistes  by  Steenstrup  (p.  114)  and  by  Valdemar-Schmidt,  “Sur 
l.es  Voyages  des  Danois  au  Greenland ” (195,  205,  with  references).  Cf.  on  these  lost  colonies  and  the  search 
for  them  Westminster  Review,  xxvii.  139  ; Harper's  Monthly,  xliv.  65  (by  I.  I.  Hayes)  ; Lippincott's  Mag., 
Aug.,  1878  ; Amcr.  Church  Rev.,  xxi.  338  ; and  in  the  general  histories,  La  Peyrere  (Dutch  transl.,  Amster- 
dam, 1678)  ; Crantz  (Eng.  transl.,  1767,  p.  272);  Egede  (Eng.  ed.,  1818,  introd.)  ; and  Rink’s  Danish  Green- 
land, ch.  r. 

“f  The  original  of  Bardsen’s  account  has  disappeared,  but  Rafn  puts  it  in  Latin,  translating  from  an  early 
copy  found  in  the  Faroe  Islands  ( Antiquitatcs  Americana,  p.  300).  Purchas  gives  it  in  English,  from  a 
copy  which  had  belonged  to  Hudson,  being  translated  from  a Dutch  version  which  Hudson  had  borrowed,  the 
Dutch  being  rendered  by  Barentz  from  a German  version.  Major  also  prints  it  in  Voyages  of  the  Zeni.  He 
recognizes  in  Bardsen’s  “Gunnbiorn’s  Skerries”  the  island  which  is  marked  in  Ruysch’s  map  (1507)  as  blown 
up  in  1456  (see  Vol.  III.  p.  9). 

5 Hakluyt,  however,  prints  some  pertinent  verses  by  Meredith,  a Welsh  bard,  in  1477. 

8 Murphy  Catal.,  no.  1489  ; Sabin,  x.  p.  322 ; Carter-Brown  Catal.  for  eds.  of  1584,  1697,  1702,  1774, 1S11, 
1832,  etc. 

7 In  the  seventeenth  century  there  were  a variety  of  symptoms  of  the  English  eagerness  to  get  the  claims  of 
Madoc  substantiated,  as  in  Sir  Richard  Hawkins’s  Observations  (Hakluyt  Soc.,  1847),  and  James  Howell’s 
Familiar  Letters  (London,  1645).  Belknap  (Amcr.  Bing.,  1794,  i.  p.  58)  takes  this  view  of  Hakluyt’s  purpose  ; 
but  Pinkerton,  Voyages,  1812,  xii.  157,  thinks  such  a charge  an  aspersion.  The  subject  was  mentioned  with  some 
particularity  or  incidentally  by  Purchas,  Abbott  (Brief  Description,  London,  1620,  1634,  1677),  Smith  (Vir- 
ginia), and  Fox  (North-West  Fox).  Sir  Thomas  Herbert  in  his  Relation  of  some  Travaile  into  Africa  and 
Asia  (London,  1634)  tracks  Madoc  to  Newfoundland,  and  he  also  found  Cymric  words  in  Mexico,  which 
assured  him  in  his  search  for  further  proofs  (Bohn’s  Lowndes,  p.  1049;  Carter-Brown,  ii.  413,  1166). 

The  Nieuwe  cn  onbekende  Weereld  of  Montanus  (Amsterdam,  1671)  made  the  story  more  familiar.  It 
necessarily  entered  into  the  discussions  of  the  learned  men  who,  in  the  seventeenth  century,  were  busied  with 
the  question  of  the  origin  of  the  Americans,  as  in  De  Laet’s  Notce  ad  dissertationem  Hugonis  Grotii  (Paris, 
1643),  who  is  inclined  to  believe  the  story,  as  is  Hornius  in  his  De  Originibus  Americaniis  (1652). 

8 Cf.  Catlin’s  No.  Amcr.  Indians,  i.  207  ; ii.  259,  262. 


I IO 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


stand  his  Welsh.  He  wrote  a statement  of  his 
experience  in  1685-6,  which  was  not  printed  till 
1740.1 

During  the  eighteenth  century  we  find  Cam- 
panius  in  his  Nye  Swerige  (1702)  repeating  the 
story;  Torfaeus  ( Hist.  Vinlandia,  1705)  not  re- 
jecting it;  Carte  [England,  1747)  thinking  it 
probable;  while  Campbell  ( Admirals , 1742), 
Lyttleton  [Henry  the  Second,  1767 ),  and  Robert- 
son [America,  1777)  thought  there  was  no 
ground,  at  least,  for  connecting  the  story  with 
America. 

It  was  reported  that  in  1764  a man,  Griffeth, 
was  taken  by  the  Shawnees  to  a tribe  of  Indians 
who  spoke  Welsh.2  In  1768,  Charles  Beatty 
published  his  Journal  of  a two  months'  Tour  in 
America  (London),  in  which  he  repeated  infor- 
mation of  Indians  speaking  Welsh  in  Pennsyl- 


vania and  beyond  the  Mississippi,  and  of  the 
finding  of  a Welsh  Bible  among  them. 

In  1772-73,  David  Jones  wandered  among  the 
tribes  west  of  the  Ohio,  and  in  1774,  at  Burling- 
ton, published  his  Journal  of  two  visits,  in  which 
he  enumerates  the  correspondence  of  words 
which  he  found  in  their  tongues  with  his  native 
Welsh.3 

Without  noting  other  casual  mentions,  some 
of  which  will  be  found  in  Paul  Barron  Wat- 
son’s bibliography  (in  Anderson’s  America  not 
discovered  by  Columbus,  p.  142),  it  is  enough 
to  say  that  towards  the  end  of  the  century  the 
papers  of  John  Williams4  and  George  Burder® 
gave  more  special  examination  to  the  subject 
than  had  been  applied  before.  » 

The  renewed  interest  in  the  matter  seems  to 
have  prompted  Southey  to  the  writing  of  his 


A BRITISH  SHIP* 


1 Gentleman' s Magazine.  It  is  reprinted  in  H.  H.  Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  v.  119,  and  in  Baldwin’s  Anc. 
America,  286.  Cf.  John  Paul  Marana,  Letters  writ  by  a Turkish  Spy,  1691,  and  later.  The  story  had  been 
told  in  The  British  Sailors'  Directory  in  1739  (Carter-Brown,  iii.  599). 

2 Warden’s  Recherches,  p.  157  ; Amos  Stoddard’s  Sketches  of  Louisiana  (Philad.,  1812),  ch.  17,  and  Philad. 
Med.  and  Physical  Journal,  1805  ; with  views  pro  and  con  by  Harry  Toulmin  and  B.  S.  Barton. 

3 The  book  was  reprinted  by  Sabin,  N.  Y.,  1865,  with  an  introduction  by  Horatio  Gates  Jones. 

4 An  inquiry  into  the  truth  of  the  tradition  concerning  the  discovery  of  America  by  Prince  Madog  (Lond., 
1791),  and  Further  Observations  . . . containing  the  account  given  by  General  Bowles,  the  Creek  or  Che- 
rokee Indian,  lately  in  London,  and  by  several  others,  of  a Welsh  tribe  of  Indians  now  living  in  the  western 
parts  of  North  America  (Lond.,  1792,  — Field’s  Ind.  Bibliog.,  nos.  1664-65).  Carey’s  American  Museum 
(April,  May,  1792),  xi.  152,  etc.,  gave  extracts  from  Williams. 

5 The  Welsh  Indians,  or  a collection  of  papers  respecting  a people  whose  ancestors  emigrated  from  Wales 
to  America  with  Prince  Madoc,  and  who  are  now  said  to  inhabit  a beautiful  country  on  the  west  side  of 
the  Mississippi  (London,  1797).  He  finds  these  conditions  in  the  Padoucas.  Goodson,  Straits  of  Anian 
(Portsmouth,  1793),  P-  7h  makes  Padoucahs  out  of  “ Madogwys  ” 1 

* After  a cut  in  The  Mirror  of  Literature,  etc.  (London,  1823),  vol.  i.  p.  177,  showing  a vessel  then  recently 
exhumed  in  Kent,  and  supposed  to  be  of  the  time  of  Edward  I,  or  the  thirteenth  century.  The  vessel  was 
sixty-four  feet  long. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


Ill 


poem  Madoc,  though  he  refrained  from  publish- 
ing it  for  some  years.  If  one  may  judge  from 
his  introductory  note,  Southey  held  to  the  his- 
torical basis  of  the  narrative.  Meanwhile,  re- 
ports were  published  of  this  and  the  other  tribes 
being  found  speaking  Welsh.1  In  1816,  Henry 
Kerr  printed  at  Elizabethtown,  New  Jersey,  his 
Travels  through  the  Western  interior  of  the 
United  States , 1808-16,  with  some  account  of  a 
tribe  whose  customs  are  similar  to  those  of  the 
ancient  Welsh.  In  1824,  Yates  and  Moulton 
(Stale  of  New  York ) went  over  the  ground 
rather  fully,  but  without  conviction.  Hugh 
Murray  ( Travels  in  North  America,  London, 
1829)  believes  the  Welsh  went  to  Spain.  In 
1834,  the  different  sides  of  the  case  were  dis- 
cussed by  Farcy  and  Warden  in  Dupaix’s  An- 
tiquites  Mexicaines.  Some  years  later  the  publi- 
cation of  George  Catlin 2 probably  gave  more 
conviction  than  had  been  before  felt,3  arising 
from  his  statements  of  positive  linguistic  corre- 
spondences in  the  language  of  the  so-called 
White4  Mandans  5 on  the  Missouri  River,  the 
similarity  of  their  boats  to  the  old  Welsh  cora- 
cles, and  other  parallelisms  of  custom.  He  be- 
lieved that  Madoc  landed  at  Florida,  or  perhaps 
passed  up  the  Mississippi  River.  His  conclusions 
were  a reinforcement  of  those  reached  by  Wil- 
liams.6 The  opinion  reached  by  Major  in  his 
edition  of  Columbus'  Letters  (London,  1847) 
that  the  Welsh  discovery  was  quite  possible, 
while  it  was  by  no  means  probable,  is  with  little 
doubt  the  view  most  generally  accepted  to-day ; 
while  the  most  that  can  be  made  out  of  the 
claim  is  presented  with  the  latest  survey  in  B. 
F.  Bowen’s  America  discovered  by  the  Welsh 


i?i  1170  a.  D.  (Philad.,  1876).  He  gathers  up, 
as  helping  his  proposition,  such  widely  scattered 
evidences  as  the  Lake  Superior  copper  mines 
and  the  Newport  tower,  both  of  which  he  ap- 
propriates ; and  while  following  the  discoverers 
from  New  England  south  and  west,  he  does  not 
hesitate  to  point  out  the  resemblance  of  the 
Ohio  Valley  mounds7  to  those  depicted  in  Pen- 
nant’s Tour  of  Wales  ; and  he  even  is  at  no  loss 
for  proofs  among  the  relics  of  the  Aztecs.8 

H.  The  Zeni  and  their  Map.  — Some- 
thing has  been  said  elsewhere  (Vol.  III.  p.  100) 
of  the  influence  of  the  Zeni  narrative  and  its 
map,  in  confusing  Frobisher  in  his  voyages. 
The  map  was  reproduced  in  the  Ptolemy  of 
1561,  with  an  account  of  the  adventures  of  the 
brothers,  but  it  was  so  far  altered  as  to  dissever 
Greenland  from  Norway,  of  which  the  Zeni 
map  had  made  it  but  an  extension.9 

The  story  got  further  currency  in  Ramusio 
(1574,  vol.  ii.),  Ortelius  (1575),  Hakluyt  (1600, 
vol.  iii.),Megiser’s  Septentrio Novantiquus  (1613), 
Purchas  (1625),  Pontanus’  Rerum  Danicarum 
(1631),  Luke  Fox’s  North-West  Fox  (1633),  and 
in  De  Laet’s  Notce  (1644),  who,  as  well  as  Hor- 
nius,  De  Originibus  Americanis  (1644),  thinks 
the  story  suspicious.  It  was  repeated  by  Mon- 
tanus  in  1671,  and  by  Capel,  Vorstellungen  des 
Norden,  in  1676.  Some  of  the  features  of  the 
map  had  likewise  become  pretty  constant  in  the 
attendant  cartographical  records.  But  from 
the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century  for  about  a 
hundred  years,  the  story  was  for  the  most  part 
ignored,  and  it  was  not  till  1784  that  the  interest 
in  it  was  revived  by  the  publications  of  Forster10 


1 Chambers'  Journal,  vi.  41 1,  mentioning  the  Asguaws. 

2 Letter  on  the  Manners,  Customs,  and  Condition  of  the  No.  Amer.  Indians  (N.  Y.,  1S42). 

8  He  convinced,  for  instance,  Fontaine  in  his  How  the  World  was  Peopled,  p.  142. 

4 On  the  variety  of  complexion  among  the  Indians,  see  Short's  No.  Amer.  of  Antiq.,  p.  189;  McCulloh’s 
Researches;  Haven,  Archccol.  U.  S.,  48;  Morton  in  Schoolcraft,  ii.  320;  Ethnolog.  Journal,  London,  July, 

1848;  App.  1849,  commenting  on  Morton. 

6  Pilling,  Bibliog.  of  Siouan  languages  (Washington,  1887,  p.  4S),  enumerates  the  authorities  on  the 
Mandan  tongue.  The  tribe  is  now  extinct.  Cf.  Morgan’s  Systems  of  Consanguinity,  p.  181. 

6 See  also  Smithsonian  Report,  1SS5,  Part  ii.  pp.  80,  271,  349,  449.  Ruxton  in  Life  in  the  Far  West 
(N.  Y.,  1846)  found  Welsh  traces  in  the  speech  of  the  Mowquas,  and  S.  Y.  McMaster  in  Smithsonian  Reft., 
1865,  heard  Welsh  sounds  among  the  Navajos. 

7 Filson  in  his  Kentzicke  has  also  pointed  out  this  possibility. 

8 The  bibliography  of  the  subject  can  be  followed  in  Watson’s  list,  already  referred  to,  and  in  that  in  the  Amer. 
Bibliofolist,  Feb.,  1869.  A few  additional  references  may  help  complete  these  lists  : Stephens’s  Literature  of 
the  Cymry,  ch.  2 ; the  Abb6  Domenech’s  Seven  Years  in  the  Great  Desert  of  America  ; Ty tier’s  Progress  of 
Discovery  ; Moosmiiller’s  Europcicr  in  Amerika  vor  Columbus  (Regensburg,  1879,  ch.  21) ; Gaffarel’s  Raffort 
etc.,  p.  216  ; Analytical  Mag.,  ii.  409  ; Atlantic  Monthly,  xxxvii.  305  ; No.  Am.  Rev.  (by  E.  E.  Hale),  lxxxv. 
305  ; Antiquary,  iv.  65  ; Southern  Presbyterian  Rev..  Jan.,  April,  1S78  ; Notes  and  Queries,  index. 

9 This  Ptolemy  map  is  reproduced  in  Gravier’s  Lcs  Normands  sur  la  route,  etc.,  6th  part,  ch.  1 ; and  in 
Nordenskjold’s  Studien  und  Forschungcn  (Leipzig,  1805),  p.  25.  The  Ptolemy  of  1562  has  the  same  plate. 

10  J.  R.  Forster’s  Discoveries  in  the  Northern  Regions.  His  confidence  was  shared  by  Eggers  (1794)  in  his 
True  Site  of  Old  East  Greenland  (Kiel),  who  doubts,  however,  if  the  descriptions  of  Estotiland  apply  to 
America.  It  was  held  to  be  a confirmation  of  the  chart  that  both  the  east  and  west  Greenland  colonies  were 
on  the  side  of  Davis’s  Straits. 


1 12 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


and  Buache,1  who  each  expressed  their  belief  in 
the  story. 

A more  important  inquiry  in  behalf  of  the 
narrative  took  place  at  Venice  in  1808,  when 
Cardinal  Zurla  republished  the  map  in  an  essay, 
and  marked  out  the  track  of  the  Zeni  on  a 
modern  chart.'2 

In  1810,  Malte-Brun  accorded  his  belief  in 
the  verity  of  the  narrative,  and  was  inclined  to 
believe  that  the  Latin  books  found  in  Estotiland 
were  carried  there  by  colonists  from  Green- 
land.3 A reactionary  view  was  taken  by  Biddle 


in  his  Sebastian  Cabot , in  1831,  who  believed  the 
publication  of  1558  a fraud;  but  the  most  effec- 
tive denial  of  its  authenticity  came  a few  years 
later  in  sundry  essays  by  Zahrtmann.4 

The  story  got  a strong  advocate,  after  nearly 
forty  years  of  comparative  rest,  when  R.  H. 
Major,  of  the  map  department  of  the  British 
Museum,  gave  it  an  English  dress  and  annexed 
a commentary,  all  of  which  was  published  by 
the  Hakluyt  Society  in  1873.  I'1  this  critic’s 
view,  the  good  parts  of  the  map  are  of  the  four- 
teenth century,  gathered  on  the  spot,  while  the 


RICHARD  H.  MAJOR* 


1 Buache  reproduced  the  map,  and  read  in  1784,  before  the  Academy  of  Inscriptions  in  Paris,  his  Memoire 
stir  la  Frisland , which  was  printed  by  the  Academy  in  1787,  p.  430. 

2 Dissertazione  intorno  ai  viaggi  e scopcrte  settentrionali  di  Nicolo  e Antonio  Fratelli  Zeni.  This  paper 
was  substantially  reproduced  in  the  same  writer’s  Di  Marco  Polo  e degli  altri  Viaggiatori  veneziani  pin 
illustri  dissertazioni  (Venice,  vSiS). 

3 Annales  des  Voyages  (1810),  x.  72  ; Precis  de  la  Geographic  (1817). 

4 Nordisk  Tidsskrift  for  Oldkyndighed  (Copenhagen,  1834),  vol.  i.  p.  1 ; Royal  Geog.  Soc.  Journal  (Lon- 
don, 1835),  v-  102  > Annales  des  Voyages  (1836),  xi. 

George  Folsom,  in  the  A7;).  Amer.  Rev.,  July,  1838,  criticised  Zahrtmann,  and  sustained  an  opposite  view.  T. 
H.  Bredsdorff  discussed  the  question  in  the  Gronlands  Historiske  Min desm ceker  (iii.  529) ; and  La  Roquette 
furnished  the  article  in  Michaud’s  Biog.  Universelle. 

* [After  a photograph  kindly  furnished  by  himself  at  the  editor’s  request.  — Ed.] 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


1 13 


false  parts  arose  from  the  misapprehensions  of 
the  young  Zeno,  who  put  together  the  book  of 
1558.1  The  method  of  this  later  Zeno  was 
in  the  same  year  (1873)  held  by  Professor  Kon- 
rad Maurer  to  be  hardly  removed  from  a fraud- 
ulent compilation  of  other  existing  material. 


There  has  been  a marked  display  of  learning,  of 
late  years,  in  some  of  the  discussions.  Cor- 
nelio  Desimoni,  the  archivist  of  Genoa,  has 
printed  two  elaborate  papers.2  The  Danish 
archivist  Frederik  Krarup  published  (1878)  a 
sceptical  paper  in  the  Geografisk  Tidsskrift  (ii. 


BARON  NORDENSKJOLD.* 


1 Major  also,  in  his  paper  ( Royal  Gcog.  Soc.  Journal,  1873)  on  “ The  Site  of  the  Lost  Colony  of  Greenland 
determined,  and  the  pre-Columbian  discoveries  of  America  confirmed,  from  fourteenth  century  documents,” 
used  the  Zeno  account  and  map  in  connection  with  Ivan  Bardsen’s  Sailing  Directions  in  placing  the  missing 
colony  near  Cape  Farewell.  Major  epitomized  his  views  on  the  question  in  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  Pros.,  Oct.,  1874. 
Sir  H.  C.  Rawlinson  commented  on  Major’s  views  in  his  address  before  the  Royal  Geog.  Society  ( Journal , 
1873,  P-  clxxxvii). 

Stevens  ( Bill . Gcographica , no.  3104)  said:  “If  the  map  be  genuine,  the  most  of  its  geography  is  false, 
while  a part  of  it  is  remarkably  accurate.” 

2 I viaggi  e la  Carta  dei  Fratelli  Zeno  Veneziani  (Florence,  1878),  and  a Studio  Secondo  ( Estratto  dall. 
Archivio  Storico  Italiano)  in  1SS5. 

* [From  a recent  photograph.  There  is  another  engraved  likeness  in  the  second  volume  of  his  Vega.] 
VOL.  I.  — 8 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


114 


145).1  The  most  exhaustive  examination,  how- 
ever, has  come  from  a practical  navigator,  the 
Baron  A.  E.  Nordenskjold,  who  in  working  up 
the  results  of  his  own  Arctic  explorations  was 
easily  led  into  the  intricacies  of  the  Zeno  con- 
troversy. The  results  which  he  reaches  are  that 
the  Zeni  narratives  are  substantially  true  ; that 
there  was  no  published  material  in  1558  which 
could  have  furnished  so  nearly  an  accurate  ac- 
count of  the  actual  condition  of  those  northern 
waters ; that  the  map  which  Zahrtmann  saw  in 
the  University  library  at  Copenhagen,  and 
which  he  represented  to  be  an  original  from 
which  the  young  Zeno  of  1558  made  his  pre- 
tended original,  was  in  reality  nothing  but  the 
Donis  map  in  the  Ptolemy  of  1482,  while  the  Ze- 
no map  is  much  more  like  the  map  of  the  north 
made  by  Claudius  Clavis  in  1427,  which  was 
discovered  by  Nordenskjold  in  a codex  of  Ptol- 
emy at  Nancy.2 * 4 

Since  Nordenskjold  advanced  his  views  there 
have  been  two  other  examinations:  the  one  by 
Professor  Japetus  Steenstrup  of  Copenhagen, 3 
and  the  other  by  the  secretary  of  the  Danish 
Geographical  Society,  Professor  Ed.  Erslef,  who 
offered  some  new  illustrations  in  his  Nye  Oplys- 
ninger  om  Broedrene  Zenis  Rejser  (Copenhagen, 
1885).“ 


Among  those  who  accept  the  narratives  there 
is  no  general  agreement  in  identifying  the  prin- 
cipal geographical  points  of  the  Zeno  map.  The 
main  dispute  is  upon  Frislanda,  the  island  where 
the  Zeni  were  wrecked.  That  it  was  Iceland 
has  been  maintained  by  Admiral  Irminger,5  and 
Steenstrup  (who  finds,  however,  the  text  not  to 
agree  with  the  map),  while  the  map  accompany- 
ing the  Studi  biogrdfici  e bibliograjici  sulla  storia 
della  geografia  in  Italia  (Rome,  1882)  traces  the 
route  of  the  Zeni  from  Iceland  to  Greenland, 
under  70°  of  latitude. 

On  the  other  hand,  Major  has  contended  for 
the  Faroe  islands,  arguing  that  while  the  en- 
graved Zeno  map  shows  a single  large  island,  it 
might  have  been  an  archipelago  in  the  original, 
with  outlines  run  together  by  the  obscurities  of 
its  dilapidation,  and  that  the  Faroes  by  their 
preserved  names  and  by  their  position  correspond 
best  with  the  Frislanda  of  the  Zeni.6  Major’s 
views  have  been  adopted  by  most  later  writers, 
perhaps,  and  a similar  identification  had  earlier 
been  made  by  Lelewel,7  Kohl,8  and  others. 

The  identification  of  Estotiland  involves  the 
question  if  the  returned  fisherman  of  the  nar- 
rative ever  reached  America.  It  is  not  uncom- 
mon for  even  believers  in  the  story  to  deny 
that  Estotiland  and  Drogeo  were  America. 
That  they  were  parts  of  the  New  World  was, 


1 “ Zeniernes  Rejse  til  Norden  et  Tolkning  Forsoeg,”  with  a fac-simile  of  the  Zeni  map. 

2 Nordenskjold’s  Om  brdderna  Zenos  resor  och  de  aldsta  barter  ofner  Norden  was  published  at  Stockholm 
in  1883,  as  an  address  on  leaving  the  presidency  of  the  Swedish  Academy,  April  12, 1882  ; and  in  the  same  year, 
at  the  Copenhagen  meeting  of  the  Congrds  des  Americanistes,  he  presented  his  Trois  Cartes  precolumbiennes, 
repre  sentant  line  partie  de  P Amerique  (Greenland),  which  included  fac-similes  of  the  Zeno  (1558)  and  Donis 
(1482)  maps  with  that  of  Claudius  Clavus  (1427).  This  last  represents  “ Islandia”  lying  midway  alone  in  the 
sea  between  “ Norwegica  Regio  ” and  “ Gronlandia  provincial  The  “ Congelatum  mare  ” is  made  to  flow  north 
of  Norway,  so  as  almost  to  meet  the  northern  Baltic,  while  north  of  this  frozen  sea  is  an  Arctic  region,  of  which 
Greenland  is  but  an  extension  south  and  west.  The  student  will  find  these  and  other  maps  making  part  of 
the  address  already  referred  to,  which  also  makes  part  in  German  of  his  Studien  und  Forschungen  veranlasst 
durck  meine  Reisen  im  hohen  Norden , antorisirte  deutsche  Ausgabe  (Leipzig,  1885).  The  maps  accompany- 
ing it  not  already  referred  to  are  the  usual  Ptolemy  map  of  the  north  of  Europe,  based  on  a MS.  of  the 
fourteenth  century;  the  “Scandinavia”  from  the  Isolario  of  Bordone,  1 547  5 that  of  the  world  in  the  MS. 
Insularium  illustration  of  Henricus  Martellus,  of  the  fifteenth  century,  in  the  British  Museum,  copied  from 
the  sketch  in  J ose  de  Lacerda’s  Exame  dos  Viagens  do  Doutor  Livingstone  (Lisbon,  1867) ; the  “ Scandinavia 
and  the  “ Carta  Marina  ” in  the  Venetian  Ptolemy  of  1548 ; the  map  of  Olaus  Magnus  in  1567  ; the  chart  of 
Andrea  Bianco  (1436) ; the  map  of  the  Basle  ed.  (1532)  of  Grynaeus’  Novis  Orbis ; that  of  Laurentius  Frisius 
(1524).  He  gives  these  maps  as  the  material  possible  to  be  used  in  1558  in  compiling  a map,  and  to  show  the 
superiority  of  the  Zeno  chart.  Cf.  Nature , xxviii.  14  ; and  Major  in  Royal  Geog.  Soc.  Proc .,  18S3,  p.  473* 

s “ Zeni’ernes  Reiser  i Norden”  in  the  publication  of  the  Royal  Society  of  Northern  Antiquaries  (Copen- 
hagen, 1883),  in  which  he  compares  the  Zeno  Frislanda  with  the  maps  of  Iceland.  He  also  communicated  to 
the  Copenhagen  meeting  of  the  Congrfcs  des  Americanistes  “ Les  voyages  des  frfcres  Zeni  dans  le  Nord  ” 
(i Compte  Rendu , p.  150). 

4 This  also  appeared  in  the  Geog.  Tidsskrift,  vii.  153,  accompanied  by  fac-similes  of  the  Zeni  map,  with 
Ruscelli’s  alteration  of  it  (1561),  and  of  the  maps  of  Donis  (1482),  Laurentius  Frisius  (1525),  and  of  the  Ptolemy 
of  1548. 

5 Roy.  Geog.  Soc.  Journal  (1879),  vol.  xlix.  p.  398,  “ Zeno’s  Frisland  is  Iceland  and  not  the  Faroes.”  and 
the  same  views  in  “ Nautical  Remarks  about  the  Zeni  Voyages  ” in  Compte  Rendu , Cong,  des  Amer.  (Copen- 
hagen, 1883),  p.  183. 

6 “ Zeno’s  Frisland  is  not  Iceland,  but  the  Faroes  ” in  Roy.  Geog.  Soc.  Journal  (1879),  xlix.  412. 

7 Geog.  du  Moyen  Age,  iii.  103. 

8 Discovery  of  Maine,  92. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


1 15 


however,  the  apparent  belief  of  Mercator  and  of 
many  of  the  cartographers  following  the  publi- 
cation of  1558,  and  of  such  speculators  as  Hugo 
Grotius,  but  there  was  little  common  consent 
in  their  exact  position.1 

I.  Alleged  Jewish  Migration.  — The 
identification  of  the  native  Americans  with  the 
stock  of  the  lost  tribes  of  Israel  very  soon  be- 
came a favorite  theory  with  the  early  Spanish 
priests  settled  in  America.  Las  Casas  and 
Duran  adopted  it,  while  Torquemada  and 
Acosta  rejected  it.  Andre  Thevet,  of  menda- 
cious memory,  did  not  help  the  theory  by  espous- 
ing it.  It  was  approved  in  J.  F.  Lumnius’s  De 
extremo  Dei  Judicio  et  Indomm  vocatione,  libri 
in.  (Venice  and  Antwerp,  1569)  ;2  and  a century 
later  the  belief  attracted  new  attention  in  the 
Origen  de  los  Americanos  de  Manasseh  Ben  Is- 
rael, published  at  Amsterdam  in  1650.3  It  was 
in  the  same  year  (1650)  that  the  question  re- 
ceived the  first  public  discussion  in  English  in 
Thomas  Thorowgood’s  /ewes  in  America ,.  or. 
Probabilities  that  the  Americans  are  of  that  Race. 
With  the  removall  of  some  contrary  reasonings, 
and  earnest  desires  for  effectuall  endeavours  to 
make  them  Christian  (London,  1650).4  Thorow- 
good  was  answered  by  Sir  Hamon  L’Estrange 


in  Americans  no  lewes,  or  Improbabilities  that 
the  America?is  are  of  that  race  (London,  1652). 
The  views  of  Thorowgood  found  sympathy  with 
the  Apostle  Eliot  of  Massachusetts ; and  when 
Thorowgood  replied  to  L’Estrange  he  joined 
with  it  an  essay  by  Eliot,  and  the  joint  work  was 
entitled  levies  in  America,  or  probabilities  that 
those  Indians  are  Judaical,  made  more  probable 
by  some  additionals  to  the  former  conjectures : an 
accurate  discourse  is  premised  of  Mr.  John  Eliot 
( who  preached  the  gospel  to  the  natives  in  their 
own  language')  touching  their  origination,  and 
his  Vindication  of  the  planters  (London,  1660). 
What  seems  to  have  been  a sort  of  supplement, 
covering,  however,  in  part,  the  same  ground,  ap- 
peared as  Vindicice  Judcecorum,  or  a true  account 
of  the  Jews,  being  more  accurately  illustrated  than 
heretofore,  which  includes  what  is  called  “ The 
learned  conjectures  of  Rev.  Mr.  John  Eliot”  (32 
pp.).  Some  of  the  leading  New  England  divines, 
like  Mayhew  and  Mather,5  espoused  the  cause 
with  similar  faith.  Roger  Williams  also  was  of 
the  same  opinion.  William  Penn  is  said  to 
have  held  like  views.  The  belief  may  be  said  to 
have  been  general,  and  had  not  died  out  in  New 
England  when  Samuel  Sewall.in  1697,  published 
his  Phcenomena  qucedam  Apocalypticaad  aspectum 
Novi  Orbis  Configurata .6 


1 Dudley,  Arcano  del  Mare , pi.  lii,  places  Estotiland  between  Davis  and  Hudson’s  Straits;  but  Torfaeus 
doubts  if  it  is  Labrador,  as  is  “ commonly  believed.”  Lafitau  ( Mceurs  des  Sauvages)  puts  it  north  of  Hudson 
Bay.  Forster  calls  it  Newfoundland.  Beauvois  (Les  colonics  Europeenes  du  Markland  ct  de  l' Escociland) 
makes  it  include  Maine,  New  Brunswick,  and  part  of  Lower  Canada.  These  are  the  chief  varieties  of  belief. 
Steenstrup  is  of  those  who  do  not  recognize  America  at  all.  Hornius,  among  the  older  writers,  thought  that 
Scotland  or  Shetland  was  more  likely  to  have  been  the  fisherman’s  strange  country.  Santarem  (Hist,  de  la 
Cartographic,  iii.  141)  points  out  an  island,  “ Y Stotlandia,”  in  the  Baltic,  as  shown  on  the  map  of  Giovanni 
Leardo  (1448)  at  Venice. 

In  P.  B.  Watson’s  Bibliog.  of  Pre-Columbian  Discoveries  of  America  there  is  the  fullest  but  not  a complete 
list  on  the  subject,  and  from  this  and  other  sources  a few  further  references  may  be  added  : Belknap’s  Amer. 
Biography ; Humboldt’s  Examcn  Critique , ii.  120;  Asher’s  Henry  Hudson,  p.  clxiv  ; Gravier’s  Decouverte  de 
l' Amerique,  183  ; Gaffarel’s  Etude  sur  l'  Amerique  avant  Colomb,  p.  261,  and  in  the  Revue  de  Geog.,  vii., 
Oct.,  Nov.,  1880,  with  the  Zeno  map  as  changed  by  Ortelius  ; De  Costa’s  Northmen  in  Maine ; Weise’s  Dis- 
coveries of  America,  p.  44  ; Goodrich’s  Columbus ; Peschel’s  Gesch.  des  Zeitalters  der  Entdeckungen  (1S5S), 
and  Ruge’s  work  of  the  same  title  ; Guido  Cora’s  l precursori  di  Cristoforo  Colombo  (Rome,  1886),  taken 
from  the  Bollettino  della  soc.  geog.  italiana,  Dec.,  1885  ; Gay’s  Pop.  Hist.  U.  S.  (i.  76) ; Foster’s  Prehistoric 
Races ; Studi  biog.  e bibliog.  soc.  geog.  ital.,  2d  ed.,  1882,  p.  117  ; P.  O.  Moosmiiller’s  Europaer  in  Amerika 
vor  Columbus,  ch.  24  ; Das  Ausland,  Oct.  11,  Dec.  27,  1886  ; Nature,  xxviii.  p.  14. 

Geo.  E.  Emery,  Lynn,  Mass.,  issued  in  1877  a series  of  maps,  making  Islandia  to  be  Spitzbergen,  with  the 
East  Bygd  of  the  Northmen  at  its  southern  end;  Frisland,  Iceland;  and  Estotiland,  Newfoundland. 

2 Sabin,  x.,  no.  42,675. 

8 There  are  editions  with  annotations  by  Robert  Ingram,  at  Colchester,  Eng.,  1792  ; and  by  Santiago 
Perez  Junquera,  at  Madrid,  1SS1.  Theoph.  Spizelius’  Elcvatio  relationis  Monteziniana  de  repertis  in  Ame- 
rica tribubus  Israeliticis  (Basle,  1661)  is  a criticism  (Leclerc,  547;  Field,  1473).  One  Montesinos  had 
professed  to  have  found  a colony  of  Jews  in  Peru,  and  had  satisfied  Manasseh  Ben  Israel  of  his  truthfulness. 

4 Cf.  collations  in  Stevens’s  Nuggets,  p.  728,  and  his  Hist.  Coll.,  ii.  no.  53S  ; Brinley,  iii.  no.  5463;  Field,  no. 
1551,  who  cites  a new  edition  in  1652,  called  Digitus  Dei : new  discoveryes,  with  some  arguments  to  prove 
that  the  lews  ( a nation ) a people  . . . inhabit  now  in  America  . . . with  the  history  of  Ant:  Montesinos 
attested  by  Mannasseh  Ben  Israeli.  A divine,  John  Dury,  had  urged  Thorowgood  to  publish,  and  had 
before  this,  in  printing  some  of  the  accounts  of  the  work  of  Eliot  and  others  among  the  New  England  Indians, 
announced  his  belief  in  the  theory. 

5 Cotton  Mather  ( Magnolia , iii.  part  2)  tells  how  Eliot  traced  the  resemblances  to  the  Jews  in  the  New 
England  Indians. 

6 2d  ed.,  1727.  Cf.  Sibley’s  Harvard  Graduates,  ii.  p.  361  ; Carter-Brown,  iii.  401. 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


1 1 6 


After  the  middle  of  the  last  century  we  begin 
to  find  new  signs  of  the  belief.  Charles  Beatty, 
in  his  Journal  of  a two  months'  tour  with  a view 
of  promoting  religion  among  the  frontier  inhabi- 
tants of  Pennsylvania  (Lond.,  1768),  finds  traces 
of  the  lost  tribes  among  the  Delawares,  and  re- 
peats a story  of  the  Indians  long  ago  selling  the 
same  sacred  book  to  the  whites  with  which  the 
missionaries  in  the  end  aimed  to  make  them  ac- 
quainted. Gerard  de  Brahm  and  Richard  Peters, 
both  familiar  with  the  Southern  Indians,  found 
grounds  for  accepting  the  belief.  The  most 
elaborate  statement  drawn  from  this  region  is 
that  of  James  Adair,  who  for  forty  years  had 
been  a trader  among  the  Southern  Indians.1 
Jonathan  Edwards  in  1788  pointed  out  in  the 
Hebrew  some  analogies  to  the  native  speech.2 
Charles  Crawford  in  1799  undertook  the  proof.3 
In  1816  Elias  Boudinot,  a man  eminent  in  his 
day,  contributed  further  arguments.4  Ethan 
Smith  based  his  advocacy  largely  on  the  lin- 
guistic elements.5  A few  years  later  an  English- 
man, Israel  Worsley,  worked  over  the  material 
gathered  by  Boudinot  and  Smith,  and  added 
something.6  A prominent  American  Jew,  M. 


M.  Noah,  published  in  1837  an  address  on  the 
subject  which  hardly  added  to  the  weight  of 
testimony.7  J.  B.  Finlay,  a mulatto  missionary 
among  the  Wyandots,  was  satisfied  with  the 
Hebrew  traces  which  he  observed  in  that  tribe.8 
Geo.  Catlin,  working  also  among  the  Western 
Indians,  while  he  could  not  go  to  the  length  of 
believing  in  the  lost  tribes,  was  struck  with  the 
many  analogies  which  he  saw.9  The  most  elab- 
orate of  all  expositions  of  the  belief  was  made 
by  Lord  Kingsborough  in  his  Mexican  Antiqui- 
ties (1830-48). 10  Since  this  book  there  has  been 
no  pressing  of  the  question  with  any  claims  to 
consideration.11 

J.  Possible  Early  African  Migrations. 
— These  may  have  been  by  adventure  or  by 
helpless  drifting,  with  or  without  the  Canaries 
as  a halting-place.  The  primitive  people  of  the 
Canaries,  the  Guanches,  are  studied  in  Sabin 
Berthelot’s  Antiquites  Canariennes  (Paris,  1879) 
and  A.  F.  de  Fontpertuis’  L'archipel  des  Cana- 
ries, et  ses  populations  primitives,  also  in  the  Revue 
de  Geographic,  June,  1882,  not  to  mention  earlier 
histories  of  the  Canary  Islands  (see  Vol.  II. 


1 The  History  of  the  American  Indians,  particularly  those  Nations  adjoining  to  the  Mississippi,  East 
and  West  Florida,  Georgia,  South  and  North  Carolina,  and  Virginia:  Containing  an  Account  of  their 
Origin,  Language,  Manners,  Religious  and  Civil  Customs,  Laws,  Form  of  Government,  etc.,  etc.,  with  an 
Appendix,  containing  a Description  of  the  Floridas,  and  the  Missisipi  Lands,  with  their  productions 
(London,  1775).  His  arguments  are  given  in  Kingsborough’s  Mcx.  Antiq.,  viii.  Bancroft  (Nat.  Races,  v. 
91)  epitomizes  them.  Adair’s  book  appeared  in  a German  translation  at  Breslau  (1782). 

2 Observations  on  the  language  of  the  Muhhekaneew  Indians , in  which  . . . some  instances  of  analogy 
between  that  and  the  Hebrew  are  pointed  out  (New  Haven.  1788).  Cf.  on  the  contrary,  Jarvis  before  the 
N.  Y.  Hist.  Soc.  in  1819. 

3 Essay  upon  the  propagation  of  the  Gospel,  in  which  there  are  facts  to  prove  that  many  of  the  Indians  in 
America  arc  descended  from  the  Ten  Tribes  (Philad.,  1799  i 2d  ecL  1801). 

4 A Star  in  the  West,  or  an  attempt  to  discover  the  long  lost  Ten  Tribes  of  Israel  (Trenton,  N.  J.,  1816). 

5 View  of  the  Hebrews,  or  the  tribe  of  Israel  in  America  (Poultney,  Vt.,  1825). 

6 A view  of  the  Amer.  Indians,  shewing  them  to  be  the  descendants  of  the  Ten  Tribes  of  Israel  (Lond., 
1828). 

" Discourse  on  the  evidences  of  the  Amer.  Indians  being  the  descendants  of  the  lost  tribes  of  Israel 
(N.  Y.,  1837).  It  is  reprinted  in  Maryatt’s  Diary  in  America,  vol.  ii. 

8 Hist,  of  the  Wyandotte  Mission  (Cincinnati,  1840)  ; Thomson’s  Ohio  Bibliog.,  409. 

9 Manners , &c.  of  the  N.  Amer.  Indians  (Lond.,  1841).  Cf.  Smithsonian  Rept.,  1885,  ii.  532, 

10  Mainly  in  vol.  vii.  ; but  see  vi.  232,  etc.  Cf.  Short,  143,  460,  and  Bancroft,  Nat.  Races  (v.  26),  with  an 
epitome  of  Kingsborough’s  arguments  (v.  84).  Mrs.  Barbara  Anne  Simon  in  her  Hope  of  Israel  (Lond.,  1829) 
advocated  the  theory  on  biblical  grounds  ; but  later  she  made  the  most  of  Kingsborough’s  amassment  of 
points  in  her  Ten  Tribes  of  Israel  historically  identified  with  the  aborigines  of  the  Western  Hemisphere 
(London,  1836). 

11  The  recognition  of  the  theory  in  the  Mormon  bible  is  well  known.  Bancroft  (v.  97)  epitomizes  its  recital, 
following  Bertrand’s  Memoires.  There  is  a repetition  of  the  old  arguments  in  a sermon,  Increase  of  the  King- 
dom of  Christ  (N.  Y.,  1831),  by  the  Indian  William  Apes  ; and  in  An  Address  by  J.  Madison  Brown  (Jack- 
son,  Miss.,  i860).  Sefior  Melgar  points  out  resemblances  between  the  Maya  and  the  Hebrew  in  the  Bol.  Soc. 
Mex.  Geog.,  iii.  Even  the  Western  mounds  have  been  made  to  yield  Hebrew  inscriptions  (Congris  des 
Amer.,  Nancy,  ii.  192). 

Many  of  the  general  treatises  on  the  origin  of  the  Americans  have  set  forth  the  opposing  arguments. 
Garcia  did  it  fairly  in  his  Origen  de  los  Indios  (1607;  ed.  by  Barcia,  1 729),  and  Bancroft  (v.  78-84)  has  con- 
densed his  treatment  Brasseur  (Hist.  Nat.  Civ.,  i.  17)  rejects  the  theory  of  the  ten  tribes  ; but  is  not  inclined 
to  abandon  a belief  in  some  scattered  traces.  Short  (pp.  135,  144)  epitomizes  the  claims.  Gaffarel  covers 
them  in  his  Etude  sur  les  rapports  de  V Amerique  (p.  87)  with  references,  and  these  last  are  enlarged  in  Ban- 
croft’s Nat.  Races,  v.  95-97. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


II 7 


p.  36).  Retzius  of  Stockholm  traces  resem- 
blances in  the  skulls  of  the  Guanches  and  the 
Caribs  ( Smithsonian  Rept.,  1859,  p.  266).  Le 
Plongeon  finds  the  sandals  of  the  statue  Chac- 
mool,  discovered  by  him  in  Yucatan,  to  resemble 
those  of  the  Guanches  (Salisbury’s  Le  Plongeon 
in  Yucatan,  57 ) . 

The  African  and  even  Egyptian  origin  of  the 


Caribs  has  had  some  special  advocates.1  Peter 
Martyr,  and  Grotius  following  him,  contended 
for  the  people  of  Yucatan  being  Ethiopian 
Christians.  Stories  of  blackamoors  being  found 
by  the  early  Spaniards  are  not  without  corrobo- 
ration.2 The  correspondence  of  the  African  and 
South  American  flora  has  been  brought  into 
requisition  as  confirmatory.3 


1 Varnhagen’s  L'origitie  touranienne  des  Americains  Tupis-Caraibes  et  des  anciens  Egyptiens,  indiquie 
principalement  par  la  philologie  comparie:  traces  dime  ancienne  migration  en  Amcrique,  invasion  du 
Br'csil par  les  Tupis  (Vienne,  1876).  Labat’s  Nouveau  Voyage  aux  isles  de  V Amcrique  (Paris,  r722),  vol.  ii. 
ch.  23.'  Sieur  de  la  Borde’s  Relation  de  Corigine,  mceurs , coutumes , etc.  des  Caraibes  (Paris,  1764).  Robert- 
son’s America.  James  Kennedy’s  Probable  origin  of  the  Amer.  Indians,  -with  particular  reference  to  that 
of  the  Caribs  (Lond.,  1854),  or  Journal  of  the  Ethnolog.  Soc.  (vol.  iv.).  London  Geog.  Journal,  iii.  290. 

2 Cf.  Peter  Martyr,  Torquemada,  and  later  writers,  like  La  Perouse,  McCulloh,  Haven  (p.  48),  Gaffarel 
{Rapport,  204),  J.  Perez  in  Rev.  Orientate  ct  Amer.,  viii.,  xii. ; Bancroft,  Nat.  Races,  iii.  458.  Bhutan  (Ad. 
dress,  1S87)  takes  exception  to  all  such  views.  Cf.  Quatrefages’  Human  Species  (N.  Y.,  1879,  pp.  200,  202). 

3 Cf.  Beccari  in  Kosmos,  Apr.,  1879;  De  Candolle  in  Geographic  botanique  (1855). 


THE  CARTOGRAPHY  OF  GREENLAND. 

The  oldest  map  yet  discovered  to  show  any  part  of  Greenland,  and  consequently  of  America,1  is  one  found 
by  Baron  Nordenskjdld  attached  to  a Ptolemy  Codex  in  the  Stadtbibliothek  at  Nancy.  He  presented  a colored 
fac-simile  of  it  in  1883  at  the  Copenhagen  Congr&s  des  Americanistes,  in  his  little  brochure  Trots  Cartes.  It 
was  also  used  in  illustration  of  his  paper  on  the  Zeni  Voyages,  published  both  in  Swedish  and  German. 
It  will  be  seen  by  the  fac-simile  given  herewith,  and  marked  with  the  author’s  name,  Claudius  Clavus,  that 
“ Gronlandia  Provincia”  is  an  extension  of  a great  arctic  region,  so  as  to  lie  over  against  the  Scandinavian 
peninsula  of  Europe,  with  “ Islandia,”  or  Iceland,  midway  between  the  two  lands.  Up  to  the  time  of  this 
discovery  by  Nordenskjdld,  the  map  generally  recognized  as  the  oldest  to  show  Greenland  is  a Genovese  por- 
tolano,  preserved  in  the  Pitti  Palace  at  Florence,  about  which  there  is  some  doubt  as  to  its  date,  which  is  said 
to  be  1417  by  Santarem  {Hist,  de  la  Cartog.,  iii.,  p.  xix),  but  Lelewel  {Epilogue,  p.  167)  is  held  to  be  trustier 
in  giving  it  as  1447.2  It  shows  how  little  influence  the  Norse  stories  of  their  Greenland  colonization  exerted 
at  this  time  on  the  cartography  of  the  north,  that  few  of  the  map-makers  deemed  it  worth  while  to  break  the 
usual  terminal  circle  of  the  world  by  including  anything  west  or  beyond  Iceland.  It  was,  further,  not  easy  to 
convince  them  that  Greenland,  when  they  gave  it,  lay  in  the  direction  which  the  Sagas  indicated.  The  map  of 
Fra  Mauro,  for  instance,  in  1459  cuts  off  a part  of  Iceland  by  its  incorrigible  terminal  circle,  as  will  be  seen 
in  a bit  of  it  given  herewith,  the  reader  remembering  as  he  looks  at  it  that  the  bottom  of  the  segment  is  to  the 
north.3  We  again  owe  to  Nordenskjdld  the  discovery  of  another  map  of  the  north,  Tabula  Rcgionum  Sep- 
tentrionalium,  which  he  found  in  a Codex  of  Ptolemy  in  Warsaw  a few  years  since,  and  which  he  places  about 
1467.  The  accompanying  partial  sketch  is  reproduced  from  a fac-simile  kindly  furnished  by  the  discoverer. 
The  peninsula  of  “ Gronlandia,”  with  its  indicated  glaciers,  is  placed  with  tolerable  accuracy  as  the  western 
extremity  of  an  arctic  region,  which  to  the  north  of  Europe  is  separated  from  the  Scandinavian  peninsula  by  a 
channel  from  the  “ Mare  Gotticum”  (Baltic  Sea),  which  sweeps  above  Norway  into  the  “Mare  Congelatum.” 
The  confused  notions  arising  from  an  attempt  by  the  compiler  of  the  map  to  harmonize  different  drafts  is 
shown  by  his  drawing  a second  Greenland  (“  Engronelant  ”)  to  his  “ Norbegia,”  or  Norway,  and  placing  just 


1 Santarem,  Hist,  dc  la  Cartog.,  iii.  76,  refers  to  maps  of 
the  fourteenth  century  in  copies  of  Ranulphus  Hydgen’s 
Polychronicott,  in  the  British  Museum  and  in  the  Advo- 
cates’ library  at  Edinburgh,  which  show  a land  in  the  north, 
called  in  the  one  Wureland  and  in  the  other  Wyhlandia. 

2 Mag.  Am.  Hist.,  April,  1883, p.  290.  Cf.  Vol.  II.  p.  28. 
The  name  used  is  “ Grinlandia.” 

3 Mauro’s  map  was  called  by  Ramusio,  who  saw  it,  an 
improved  copy  of  one  brought  from  Cathay  by  Marco 
Polo.  It  is  preserved  in  the  Biblioteca  Marciana  at  Venice. 
It  was  made  by  Mauro  under  the  command  of  Don  Alonso 
V.,  and  Bianco  assisted  him.  The  exact  date  is  in  dispute; 


but  all  agree  to  place  it  between  1457  and  1460.  A copy 
was  made  on  vellum  in  rSo4,  which  is  now  in  the  British 
Museum.  Our  cut  follows  one  corner  of  the  reproduction 
in  Santarem ’s  Atlas.  A photographic  fac-simile  has  been 
issued  in  Venice  by  Ongania,  and  St.  Martin  (Atlas,  p.  vii) 
follows  this  fac-simile.  Ruge  ( Geschichte  des  Zeitalters  der 
Entdeckungcn ) gives  a modernized  and  more  legible  repro- 
duction. There  are  other  drawings  in  Zurla’s  Fra  Mauro  ; 
Vincent's  Commerce  and  Navigation  of  the  Ancients 
(1797,  1S07);  Lelewel’s  Moyen  Age  (pi.  xxxiii).  Cf.  Studi 
della  Soc.  Geograjia  Italia  (1882),  ii.  76,  for  references. 


1 1 8 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


under  it  the  “ Thile  ” 1 of  the  ancients,  which  he  makes  a different  island  from  « Islandia,”  placed  in  proper 
relations  to  his  larger  Greenland. 

A few  years  later,  or  perhaps  about  the  same  time,  and  before  1471,  the  earliest  engraved  map  which  shows 
Greenland  is  that  of  Nicolas  Donis,  in  the  Ulm  edition  of  Ptolemy  in  1482.  It  will  be  seen  from  the  little 
sketch  which  is  annexed  that  the  same  doubling  of  Greenland  is  adhered  to.2  With  the  usual  perversion  put 


:pt  Womens 


, itottc  xtgie 


)\kr\ 


CLAUDIUS  CLAVUS,  1427. 


1 Rafn  gives  a large  map  of  Iceland  with  the  names  of 
a.  d.  1000.  On  the  errors  of  early  and  late  maps  of  Iceland 
see  Baring-Gould’s  Ultima  Thule , i.  253.  On  the  varying 
application  of  the  name  Thule,  Thyle,  etc.,  to  the  northern 
regions  or  to  particular  parts  of  them,  see  R.  F.  Burton’s 
Ultima  Thule , a Summer  in  Iceland  (London,  1875), 
ch.  1.  Bunbury  (Hist.  Anc.  Geog .,  ii.  527)  holds  that  the 
Thule  of  Marinus  of  Tyre  and  of  Ptolemy  was  the  Shet- 


lands.  Cf.  James  Wallace’s  Description  0/  the  Orkney 
islands  (1693,  — new  ed.,  1887,  by  John  Small)  for  an  essay 
on  “ the  Thule  of  the  Ancients.”  • 

2 There  are  other  reproductions  of  the  map  in  full,  in 
Nordenskjold’s  Vega,  i.  51  ; in  his  Broderna  Zenos , and 
in  his  Studien,  p.  31.  Cf.  also  the  present  History , II., 
p.  28,  for  other  bibliographical  detail ; Hassler,  Buchdruck- 
ergeschichte  Ulm' s ; D’Avezac’s  IValtzemiiller , 23  ; Wil- 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


ng 


upon  the  Norse  stories,  Iceland  is  made  to  lie  due  west  of  Greenland,  though  not  shown  in  the  present 
sketch. 

At  a date  not  much  later,  say  i486,  it  is  supposed  the  Laon  globe,  dated  in  1493,  was  actually  made,  or  at 
least  it  is  shown  that  in  some  parts  the  knowledge  was  rather  of  the  earlier  date,  and  here  we  have  “ Grolan- 
dia,”  a small  island  off  the  Norway  coast.1 


We  have  in  1489-90  a type  of  configuration,  which  later  became  prevalent.  It  is  taken  from  an  Insularitim 
illustratum  Henrici  Martclli  Germanic  manuscript  preserved  in  the  British  Museum,  and  shows,  as  seen  by 
the  annexed  extract,  a long  narrow  peninsula,  running  southwest  from  the  northern  verge  of  Europe.  A sketch 
of  the  whole  map  is  given  elsewhere.2 

berforce  Eames’s  Bibliography  of  Ptolemy,  separately,  1 Cf  D’Avezac  in  Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Giog.,  xx.  417. 

and  in  Sabin’s  'Dictionary ; and  Winsor’s  Bibliog.  of  2 See  Vol.  II.  p.  41.  There  is  another  sketch  in  Nor- 

Ptolemy* s Geography . denskjold’s  Studien,  etc.,  p.  33,  which  is  reduced  from  a 


120 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


This  seems  to  have  been  the  prevailing  notion  of  what  and  where  Greenland  was  at  the  time  of  Columbus’ 
voyage,  and  it  could  have  carried  no  significance  to  his  mind  that  the  explorations  of  the  Norse  had  found  the 
Asiatic  main,  which  he  started  to  discover.  How  far  this  notion  was  departed  from  by  Behaim  in  his  globe 
of  1492  depends  upon  the  interpretation  to  be  given  to  a group  of  islands,  northwest  of  Iceland  and  northeast 
of  Asia,  upon  the  larger  of  which  he  writes  among  its  mountains,  “ Hi  man  weise  Volker.”  1 

As  this  sketch  of  the  cartographical  development  goes  on,  it  will  be  seen  how  slow  the  map-makers  were  to 
perceive  the  real  significance  of  the  Norse  discoveries,  and  how  reluctant  they  were  to  connect  them  with  the 
discoveries  that  followed  in  the  train  of  Columbus,  though  occasionally  there  is  one  who  is  possessed  with  a sort 
of  prevision.  The  Cantino  map  of  1502  2 does  not  settle  the  question,  for  a point  lying  northeast  of  the  Por- 
tuguese discoveries  in  the  Newfoundland  region  only  seems  to  be  the  southern  extremity  of  Greenland.  What 
was  apparently  a working  Portuguese  chart  of  1503  grasps  pretty  clearly  the  relations  of  Greenland  to 
Labrador.3 


Lelewel  (pi.  43),  in  a map  made  to  show  the  Portuguese  views  at  this  time,*  which  he  represents  by  combining 
and  reconciling  the  Ptolemy  maps  of  1 5 1 1 and  1513,  still  places  the  “Gronland”  peninsula  in  the  northwest 
of  Europe,  and  if  his  deductions  are  correct,  the  Portuguese  had  as  yet  reached  no  clear  conception  that  the 
Labrador  coasts  upon  which  they  fished  bore  any  close  propinquity  to  those  which  the  Norse  had  colonized. 
Ruysch,  in  1508,  made  a bold  stroke  by  putting  “Gruenlant”  down  as  a peninsula  of  Northeastern  Asia, 
thus  trying  to  reconcile  the  discoveries  of  Columbus  with  the  northern  sagas.5  This  view  was  far  from  accept- 
able. Sylvanus,  in  the  Ptolemy  of  1511,  made  u Engroneland  ” a small  protuberance  on  the  north  shore  of 
Scandinavia,  and  east  of  Iceland,  evidently  choosing  between  the  two  theories  instead  of  accepting  both,  as 


fac-simile  given  in  Jos£  de  Lacerda’s  Exame  dos  Viagens 
do  Doutor  Livingstone  (Lissabon,  1867).  The  present  ex- 
tract is  from  Santarem,  pi.  50.  Cf.  O.  Peschel  in  Aus- 
land,  Feb.  13,  1857,  and  his  posthumous  Auhandhingen , 
i.  213. 

1 See  references  in  Vol.  II.  p.  105. 

2 See  Vol.  II.  p.  108. 


3 See  post,  Vol.  IV.  p.  35;  and  Kohl’s  Discovery  of 
Maine , p.  174.  Cf.  Winsor’s  Bibliog.  of  Ptolemy , sub 
anno  1511. 

4 He  holds  that  the  1513  Ptolemy  map  v.as  drawn  in 
1501-4,  and  was  engraved  before  Dec.  10,  1508. 

c See  Vol.  II.  p.  115. 


TABULA  REGIONUM  SEPTENTRIONALIUM,  1467. 


122 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


was  common,  in  ignorance  of  their  complemental  relations.!  WaldseemUller,  in  the  Ptolemy  of  1513,  in  his 
“ Orbis  typus  universalis,”  reverted  to  and  adopted  the  delineation  of  Henricus  Martellus  in  1490.2 

In  1520,  Apian,  in  the  map  in  Camer’s  Solinus,  took  the  view  of  Sylvanus,  while  still  another  representation 
was  given  by  Laurentius  Frisius  in  1522,  in  an  edition  of  Ptolemy ,3  in  which  “Gronland”  becomes  a large 


island  on  the  Norway  coast,  in  one  map  called  “ Orbis  typus  Universalis,”  while  in  another  map,  “ Tabula 
nova  Norbegiae  et  Gottiae,”  the  “ Engronelant  ” peninsula  is  a broad  region,  stretching  from  Northwestern 
Europe.4  This  Ptolemy  was  again  issued  in  1525,  repeating  these  two  methods  of  showing  Greenland  already 
given,  and  adding  a third,5  that  of  the  long  narrow  European  peninsula,  already  familiar  in  earlier  maps  — the 
variety  of  choice  indicating  the  prevalent  cartographical  indecision  on  the  point. 


1 Winsor’s  Bibliog.  of  Ptolemy,  sub  anno  isri. 

5 See  Vol.  II.  p.  hi.  Winsor’s  Ptolemy,  sub  anno 
1513.  Reisch,  in  151c,  seems  to  have  been  of  the  same 
opinion.  Cf.  the  bibliography  of  Reisch’s  Margarita 
Philosophia  in  Sabin’s  Dictionary , vol.  xvi.,  and  separately, 
prepared  by  Wilberforce  Eames.  Reisch’s  map  is  given 
post,  Vol.  II.  p.  114.  Another  sketch  of  this  map,  with  an 
examination  of  the  question,  where  the  name  “Zoana 


Mela,”  applied  on  it  to  America,  came  from,  is  given  by 
Frank  Wieser  in  the  Zeitschrift  fur  IVissensch.  Geogra- 
phic (Carlsruhe),  vol.  v.,  a sight  of  which  I owe  to  the 
author,  who  believes  Waldseemiiller  made  the  map. 

s The  map  is  given , post,  Vol.  II.  175.  Cf.  also  Nor- 
denskjold,  Studien,  p.  53. 

4 Cf.  Winsor’s  Bibliog.  of  Ptolemy,  sub  anno  1522. 
e Winsor’s  Bibliog . of  Ptolemy,  sub  anno  1525*  This 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


123 


Kohl,  in  his  collection  of  maps,1  copies  from  what  he  calls  the  Atlas  of  Frisius,  1525,  still  another  map 
which  apparently  shows  the  southern  extremity  of  Greenland,  with  “ Terra  Laboratoris,”  an  island  just  west 


OLAUS  MAGNUS,  1539* 

map  is  no.  49,  “ Gronlandiaj  et  Riissbe.”  Cf.  Witsen's  1 Winsor’s  Kohl  Collection,  no.  102. 

Noorden  Oost  Tartarye  (1705),  vol.  ii.  * See  Note,  p.  125. 


CARTA  MARINA  ET  DESCRIPTION XSEPTEMTRIONALIVM 


124 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


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* This  map,  here  reproduced  on  a somewhat  smaller  scale,  is  called:  Regnorum  Aquilonamm  description  kujus 
Operis  subiectum. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


125 


of  it,  and  southwest  of  that  a bit  of  coast  marked  “ Terra  Nova  Conterati,”  which  may  pass  for  Newfound- 
land and  the  discoveries  of  Cortereal. 

Thorne,  the  Englishman,  in  the  map  which  he  sent  from  Seville  in  1527,1  seems  to  conform  to  the  view  which 
made  Greenland  a European  peninsula,  which  may  also  have  been  the  opinion  of  Orontius  Finaeus  in  1531.2 
A novel  feature  attaches  to  an  Atlas,  of  about  this  date,  preserved  at  Turin,  in  which  an  elongated  Greenland 
is  made  to  stretch  northerly.8  In  1532  we  have  the  map  in  Ziegler’s  Schondia,  which  more  nearly  resembles 
the  earliest  map  of  all,  that  of  Claudius  Clavus,  than  any  other.4  The  1538  cordiform  map  of  Mercator 
makes  it  a peninsula  of  an  arctic  region  connected  with  Scandinavia.5  This  map  is  known  to  me  only 
through  a fac-simile  of  the  copy  given  in  the  Geografia  of  Lafreri,  published  at  Rome  about  1560,  with  which 
I am  favored  by  Nordenskjold  in  advance  of  its  publication  in  his  Atlas. 

The  great  Historia  of  Olaus  Magnus,  as  for  a long  time  the  leading  authority  on  the  northern  geography, 
as  well  as  on  the  Scandinavian  chronicles,  gives  us  some  distinct  rendering  of  this  northern  geographical 
problem.  It  was  only  recently  that  his  earliest  map  of  1539  has  been  brought  to  light,  and  a section  of  it  is 
here  reproduced  from  a much  reduced  fac-simile  kindly  sent  to  the  editor  by  Dr.  Oscar  Brenner  of  the  uni- 
versity at  Munich.*  Nordenskjold,  in  giving  a full  fac-simile  of  the  Olaus  Magnus  map  of  1567,6  of  which  a 


1 Given  post,  Vol.  III.  p.  17. 

8 Given  post,  Vol.  III.  p.  11. 

3 Jahrb.  des  Vereinsfiir  Erdkunde  in  Dresden  { 1870), 
tab.  vii.  A similar  feature  is  in  the  map  described  by  Pe- 
schel  in  the  Jahresbericht  des  Vereinsfiir  Erdkunde  in 
Leipzig  (1871).  It  is  also  to  be  seen  in  the  Homem  map  of 
about  1540  (given  in  Vol.  IT.  p.  446),  and  in  the  map  which 
Major  assigns  to  Baptista  Agnese,  and  which  was  published 
in  Paris  in  1875  as  a Portulan  de  Charles  Quint.  (Cf.  Vol. 
II.  p.  445.) 

4 There  is  a fac-simile  of  Ziegler’s  map  in  Vol.  TI.  434; 


also  in  Goldsmid’s  ed.  of  Hakluyt  (Edinb.,  1885),  and  in 
Nordenskjo'd’s  Vega,  i.  52. 

6 The  map  (1551)  of  Gemma  Frisius  in  Apian  is  much  the 
same. 

0 In  the  Basle  ed.  of  the  Historia  de  Gentium.  Cf.  Nor- 
denskjold’s  Vega,  vol.  i.,  who  says  that  the  tup  originally 
appeared  in  Magnus’s  A us/egung  tend  Vcrklarung  der 
Neuen Mappen  von  den  Alten  Gocttenreich  (Venice,  1539)  ; 
and  is  different  from  the  map  which  appeared  in  the  inter- 
mediate edition  of  1555  at  Rome,  a part  of  which  is  also  an- 
nexed. 


Note  to  Map  on  p.  123. — This  fac-simile  accompanies  a paper  appearing  in  the  Vidgnskabsselskabs  Forhatidinger 
(1886,  no.  1 5)  and  separately  as  Die  iichte  karte  des  Olaus  Magnus  vom  jahre  IJJQ,  nach  dem  exemplar  der  Munchener 
Siaatsbibliothek  (Christiania,  1886).  In  this  Dr.  Brenner  traces  the  history  of  the  great  map  of  Archbishop  Olaus 
Magnus,  pointing  out  how  Nordenskjold  is  in  error  in  supposing  the  map  of  1567,  which  that  scholar  gives,  was  but  a 


126 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


fragment  is  herewith  also  given  in  fac-simile,  says  that  it  embodies  the  views  of  the  northern  geographers  in 
separating  Greenland  from  Europe,  which  was  in  opposition  to  those  of  the  geographers  of  the  south  of  Europe, 
who  united  Greenland  to  Scandinavia.  Sebastian  Munster  in  his  1540  edition  of  Ptolemy  introduced  a new  con- 
fusion. He  preserved  the  European  elongated  peninsula,  but  called  it  “ Islandia,”  while  to  what  stands  for 
Iceland  is  given  the  old  classical  name  of  Thyle.1  This  confusion  is  repeated  in  his  map  of  1545,2  where  he 
makes  the  coast  of  “ Islandia  ” continuous  with  Baccalaos.  This  continuity  of  coast  line  seemed  now  to 
become  a common  heritage  of  some  of  the  map-makers,3  though  in  the  Ulpius  globe  of  1542  “ Groestlandia,” 
so  far  as  it  is  shown,  stands  separate  from  either  continent,4  but  is  connected  with  Europe  according  to  the 
early  theory  in  the  Isolario  of  Bordone  in  1547. 

We  have  run  down  the  main  feature  of  the  northern  cartography,  up  to  the  time  of  the  publication  of  the 
Zeno  map  in  1558.  The  chief  argument  for  its  authenticity  is  that  there  had  been  nothing  drawn  and  pub- 
lished up  to  that  time  which  could  have  conduced,  without  other  aid,  to  so  accurate  an  outline  of  Greenlard  as 
it  gives.  In  an  age  when  drafts  of  maps  freely  circulated  over  Europe,  from  cartographer  to  cartographer,  in 


BORDONE’S  SCANDINAVIA,  1547* 


1 The  same  is  done  in  the  Ptolemy  of  1548  (Venice). 

There  is  a fac-simile  in  Nordenskjbld’s  Studien , p.  35. 

2 See  Vol.  IV.  p.  84. 

3 We  find  it  in  the  Nancy  globe  of  about  1540  (sec  Vol. 

IV.  p.  81);  in  the  Mercator  gores  of  1541  (Vol.  II.  p.  177); 
and  in  the  Ruscelli  map  of  1544  (Vol.  II.  p.  432),  where 
Greenland  (Grotlandia)  is  simply  a neck  connecting  Europe 
with  America ; and  in  Gastaldi  “ Carta  Marina,”  in  the 
Italian  Ptolemy  of  1548,  where  it  is  a protuberance  on  a 

reproduction  of  the  original  edition  of  1539,  which  was  not  known  to  modem  students  till  Brenner  found  it  in  the  library 
at  Munich,  in  March,  1886,  and  which  proves  to  be  twelve  times  larger  than  that  of  1567.  Brenner  adds  the  long  Latin 
address,  “ Olaus  Gothus  benigno  lectori  sa’utem,”  with  annotations.  The  map  is  entitled  “ Carta  Marina  et  descriptio 
septentrionalium  errarum  ac  mirabilium  rerum  in  eis  contentarum  diligentissime  elaborata,  Anno  Dni,  1 539- Brenner 
institutes  a close  comparison  between  it  and  the  Zeno  chart. 

* Reproduced  from  the  fac-simile  given  in  Nordenskjold’s  Studien  (Leipzig,  1885). 


similar  neck  (see  Vol.  II.  435  ; IV.  43;  and  Nordenskjold’s 
Studien , 43).  The  Rotz  map  of  1542  seems  to  be  based  on 
the  same  material  used  by  Mercator  in  his  gores,  but  he 
adds  a new  confusion  in  calling  Greenland  the  “ Cost  of 
Labrador.”  Cf.  Winsor’s  Kohl  Maps , no.  104.  The 
“ Grutlandia  ” of  the  Vopellio  map  of  1556  is  also  continu- 
ous with  Labrador  (see  Vol.  II.  436 ; IV . 90). 

4 See  Vol.  IV.  pp.  42,  82. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


127 


manuscript,  it  does  not  seem  necessary  that  the  search  for  prototypes  or  prototypic  features  should  be  confined 
to  those  which  had  been  engraved.  With  these  allowances  the  map  does  not  seem  to  be  very  exceptional  in 
any  feature.  It  is  connected  with  northwestern  Europe  in  just  the  manner  appertaining  to  several  of  the 
earlier  maps.  Its  shape  is  no  great  improvement  on  the  map  of  1467,  found  at  Warsaw.  There  was  then 


* The  original  measures  12X15!  inches.  F ac-similes  of  the  original  size  or  reduced,  or  other  reproductions,  will  be  found 
in  Nordenskjold’s  Trots  Cartes,  and  in  his  Studien ; Malte  Brun’s  Annates  des  Voyages;  Lelewel’s  Moyen  Age  (ii. 

, 169) ; Carter-Brown  Catalogue  (i.  21 1)  ; Kohl’s  Discovery  of  Maine , 97  ; Ruge’s  Geschichte  des  Zeitaltcrs  dor  Ent- 
deckungen,  p.  27 ; Bancroft’s  Central  A tnerica,  i.  81 ; Gay’s  Pop.  Hist.  U.  S.,  i.  84  ; Howley’s  Ecclesiast.  Hist.  New- 
foundland, p.  45  ; Erizzo’s  Le  Scopertc  A rtic/ie  (Venice,  1855),  — not  to  name  others. 


128 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


THE  PTOLEMY  ALTERATION  (1561,  etc.)  OF  THE  ZENO  MAP. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


129 


no  such  constancy  in  the  placing  of  midsea  islands  in  maps,  to  interdict  the  random  location  of  other  islands 
at  the  cartographer’s  will,  without  disturbing  what  at  that  day  would  have  been  deemed  geographical  proba- 
bilities, and  there  was  all  the  necessary  warranty  in  existing  maps  for  the  most  wilfully  depicted  archipelago. 
The  early  Portuguese  charts,  not  to  name  others,  gave  sufficient  warrant  for  land  where  Estotiland  and  Drogeo 
appear. 

Mention  has  already  been  made  of  the  changes  in  this  map,  which  the  editors  of  the  Ptolemy  of  1561  made 
in  severing  Greenland  from  Europe,  when  they  reengraved  it.1  The  same  edition  contained  a map  of  “ Schon- 
landia,”  in  which  it  seems  to  be  doubtful  if  the  land  which  stands  for  Greenland  does,  or  does  not,  connect 
with  the  Scandinavian  main.'2 3  That  Greenland  was  an  island  seems  now  to  have  become  the  prevalent  opinion, 
and  it  was  enforced  by  the  maps  of  Mercator  (1569  and  1587),  Ortelius  (1570,  1575),  and  Gallaeus  (1585), 
which  placed  it  lying  mainly  east  and  west  between  the  Scandinavian  north  and  the  Labrador  coast,  which  it 
was  now  the  fashion  to  call  Estotiland.  In  its  shape  it  closely  resembled  the  Zeni  outline.  Another  feature  of 
these  maps  was  the  placing  of  another  but  smaller  island  west  of  “ Groenlant,”  which  was  called  “ Grocland,” 
and  which  seems  to  be  simply  a reduplication  of  the  larger  island  by  some  geographical  confusion, s which 
once  started  was  easily  seized  upon  to  help  fill  out  the  arctic  spaces.4 


SEPTENTRIONALES  REGIONES.* 


It  was  just  at  this  time  (1570)  that  the  oldest  maps  which  display  the  geographical  notions  of  the  saga  men 
were  drawn,  though  not  brought  to  light  for  many  years.  We  note  two  such  of  this  time,  and  one  of  a date 
near  forty  years  later.  One  marked  “ Jonas,  Gudmundi  filius,  delineavit,  1570,”  is  given  as  are  the  two  others 
by  Torf®us  in  his  Gronlandia  Antigua.  They  all  seem  to  recognize  a passage  to  the  Arctic  seas  between 
Norway  and  Greenland,  the  northern  parts  of  which  last  are  called  “ Risaland,”  or  “ Riseland,”  and  Jonas 
places  “ Oster  Bygd”  and  “ Wester  Bygd”  on  the  opposite  sides  of  a squarish  peninsula.  Beyond  what  must 
be  Davis’  Straits  is  “ America,”  and  further  south  “ Terra  Florida  ” and  “ Albania.” 

If  this  description  is  compared  with  the  key  of  Stephanius’  map,  next  to  be  mentioned,  while  we  remember 


1 In  the  edition  of  1562,  which  repeated  the  map,  the 
cartographer  Moletta  (Moletius)  testified  that  its  geography 
had  been  confirmed  “ by  letters  and  marine  charts  sent  to 
us  from  divers  parts.” 

2 Winsor’s  Bibliog.  of  Ptolemy , sub  anno  1561. 

3 Lok’s  map  of  1582  calls  it  “ Groetland,”  the  landfall 
of  “ Jac.  Scolvus,”  the  Pole.  Cf.  Vol.  1 1 T.  40. 

* For  Mercator’s  map,  see  Vol.  II.  452;  IV.  94,  373. 
Ortelius’  separate  map  of  Scandia  is  much  the  same.  It  is 
the  same  with  the  map  of  Phillipus  Galla;us,  dated  1574,  but 
published  at  Antwerp  in  1585  in  the  Theatri  orbis  terra- 


rum  Enchiridion.  Gilbert’s  map  in  1576  omits  the  “ Groc- 
land” (Vol.  III.  203).  Both  features,  however,  are  pre- 
served in  the  Judahs  of  1593  (Vol.  IV.  97),  in  the  Wytfliet 
of  1597  (Vol.  II.  459),  in  Wolfe’s  Linschoten  in  1598  (Vol. 
III.  101),  and  in  Quadus  in  1600  (Vol.  IV.  101).  In  the 
Zalti&re  map  of  1566  (Vol.  II.  451  ; IV.  93),  in  the  Porcac- 
chi  map  of  1572  (Vol.  II.  96,  453;  IV.  96),  and  in  that  of 
Johannes  Martines  of  1578,  the  features  are  too  indefinite 
for  recognition.  Lelewel  (i.  pi.  7)  gives  a Spanish  mappe- 
monde  of  1573. 


* From  Theatri  orbis  Terr  arum  Enchiridion,  per  Phillipum  Gallaum,  it  per  Hugoncm  AVtz/oA'Kwt  (Antwerp,  15S5). 
VOL.  I.  — 9 


130 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


that  both  represent  the  views  prevailing  in  the  north  in  1570,  it  is  hard  to  resist  the  conclusion  that  Vinland 
was  north  even  of  Davis’  Straits,  or  at  least  held  to  be  so  at  that  time. 

The  second  map,  that  of  Stephanius,  is  reproduced  herewith,  dating  back  to  the  same  period  (1570) ; but 
the  third,  by  Gudbrandus  Torlacius,  was  made  in  1606,  and  is  sketched  in  Kohl’s  Discovery  of  Maine  (p.  109). 
It  gives  better  shape  to  “ Gronlandia”  than  in  either  of  the  others. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  follow  the  course  of  the  Greenland  cartography  farther  with  any  minuteness.  As  the 
sixteenth  century  ended  we  have  leading  maps  by  Hakluyt  in  1587  and  1599  (see  Vol.  III.  42),  and  De  Bry  in 
1596  (Vol.  IV.  99),  and  Wytfliet  in  1597,  all  of  which  give  Davis’s  Straits  with  more  or  less  precision.  Ba- 
rentz’s  map  of  1598  became  the  exemplar  of  the  circumpolar  chart  in  Pontanus’  Henan  et  Urbis  Amstcloda- 
mensium  Historic  of  1611.1  The  chart  of  Luke  Fox,  in  1635,  marked  progress  2 better  than  that  of  La  Pey* 


SIGURD  STEPHANIUS,  1370* 


1 In  fac-simile  in  Nordenskjbld’s  Vega , i.  247.  2 Vol.  Ill  p.  98. 

* Reproduced  from  the  Saga  Time  of  J.  Fulford  Vicary  (London,  1887),  after  the  map  as  given  in  the  publication  of 
the  geographical  society  at  Copenhagen,  1885-86,  and  it  is  supposed  to  have  been  drafted  upon  the  narrative  of  the  sagas. 
Key  : “A.  This  is  where  the  English  have  come  and  has  a name  for  barrenness,  either  from  sun  or  cold.  B.  This  is 
near  where  Vineland  lies,  which  from  its  abundance  of  useful  things,  or  from  the  land’s  fruitfulness,  is  called  Good.  Our 
countrymen  (Icelanders)  have  thought  that  to  the  south  it  ends  with  the  wild  sea  and  that  a sound  or  fjord  separates  it 
from  America.  C.  This  land  is  called  Riiseland  or  land  of  the  giants,  as  they  have  horns  and  are  called  Skrickfinna 
(Fins  that  frighten).  D.  This  is  more  to  the  east,  and  the  people  are  called  Klofinna  (Fins  with  claws)  on  account  of 
their  large  nails.  E.  This  is  Jotunheimer,  or  the  home  of  the  misshapen  giants.  F.  Here  is  thought  to  be  a fjord,  or 
sound,  leading  to  Russia.  G.  A rocky  land  often  referred  to  in  histories.  H.  What  island  that  is  I do  not  know,  unless 
it  be  the  island  that  a Venetian  found,  and  the  Germans  call  Friesland.” 

It  will  be  observed  under  the  B of  the  Key,  the  Norse  of  1570  did  not  identify  the  Vinland  of  1000  with  the  America  of 
later  discoveries. 

This  map  is  much  the  same,  but  differs  somewhat  in  detail,  from  the  one  called  of  Stephanius,  as  produced  in  Kohl’s 
Discovery  of  Maine , p.  107,  professedly  after  a copy  given  in  Torfaeus’  Gronla?tdia  Antique  (1706).  Torfaeus  quotes 
Theodoras  Torlacius,  the  Icelandic  historian,  as  saying  that  Stephanius  appears  to  have  drawn  his  map  from  ancient  Ice- 
landic records.  The  other  maps  given  by  Torfaeus  are  : by  Bishop  Gudbrand  Thorlakssen  (1606) ; by  Jonas  Gudmund 
(1640) ; by  Theodor  Thorlakssen  (1666),  and  by  Torfaeus  himself.  Cf.  other  copies  of  the  map  of  Stephanius  in  Malte- 
Brun’s  Ataiales  des  Voyages , Weise's  Discoveries  of  America , p.  22;  Geog.  Tidskrift)  viii.  123,  and  in  Horsford’s 
Disc,  of  A meric  a by  North?nen , p.  37. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  EXPLORATIONS. 


131 


r£re  (1647),  though  his  map  was  better  known.1  Even  as  late  as  1 727,  Hermann  Moll  could  not  identify  his 
“Greenland”  with  “ Groenland.”  In  1741,  we  have  the  map  of  Hans  Egede  in  his  “ Gronland,”  repeated  in 


1 A paper  by  H.  Rink  in  the  Geografisk  T idskrift  (viii. 
139)  entitled  “ Ostgronlandeme  i deres  Forhold  till  Vest- 
gronlanderne  og  de  ovrige  Eskimostammer,”  is  accompa- 
nied by  drafts  of  the  map  of  G.  Tholacius,  1606,  and  of  Th. 
Thorlacius,  1668-69,  — the  latter  placing  East  Bygd  on  the 
east  coast  near  the  south  end.  K.  J.  V.  Steenstrup,  on 


Osterbygden  in  Geog.  Tidskrift , viii.  123,  gives  fac-similes 
of  maps  of  Jovis  Carolus  in  1634;  of  Hendrick  Doncker 
in  1669.  Sketches  of  maps  by  Johannes  Meyer  in  1652, 
and  by  Hendrick  Doncker  in  1666,  are  also  given  in  the 
Geografisk  Tidskrift , viii.  (1885),  pi.  5. 


Note.  — The  annexed  map  is  a reduced  fac-simile  of  the  map  in  the  Efterretninger  ont  Gronland  uddragne  af  en 
Jourtial  holden  fra  777/  til  1788 , by  Paul  Egede  (Copenhagen,  1789).  Paul  Egede,  son  of  Hans,  was  bom  in  1708,  and 
remained  in  Greenland  till  1740.  He  was  made  Bishop  of  Greenland  in  1770,  and  died  in  1789.  The  above  book  gives 
a portrait.  There  is  another  fac-simile  of  the  map  in  Nordenskjold’s  Exped.  till  Gronland \ p.  234. 


132 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


late  editions,  and  the  old  delineation  of  the  east  coast  after  Torfaeus  was  still  retained  in  the  1788  map  of 
Paul  Egede. 

In  the  map  of  1653,  made  by  De  la  Martiniere,  who  was  of  the  Danish  expedition  to  the  north,  Greenland 
was  made  to  connect  with  Northern  Asia  by  way  of  the  North  pole.1  Nordenskjold  calls  him  the  Miinch- 
hausen  of  the  northeast  voyagers  ; and  by  his  own  passage  in  the  “ Vega,”  along  the  northern  verge  of  Europe, 
from  one  ocean  to  the  other,  the  Swedish  navigator  has  of  recent  years  proved  for  the  first  time  that  Greenland 
has  no  such  connection.  It  yet  remains  to  be  proved  that  there  is  no  connection  to  the  north  with  at  least 
the  group  of  islands  that  are  the  arctic  outlyers  of  the  American  continent. 


1 Voyages  des  Pais  Septentrionaux,  — a very  popular  book. 

* Extracted  from  the  “ Carte  de  Greenland  ” in  Isaac  de  la  Peyr&re’s  Relation  du  Groenland  (Paris,  1647).  CL  Wia- 
sor's  Kohl  Maps , no.  122. 


Ohient. 


CHAPTER  III. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


BY  JUSTIN  WINSOR. 


THE  traditions  of  the  migrations  of  the  Chichimecs,  Colhuas,  and  Na- 
huas,”  says  Max  Muller, 1 “are  no  better  than  the  Greek  traditions 
about  Pelasgians,  yEolians,  and  Ionians,  and  it  would  be  a mere  waste  of 
time  to  construct  out  of  such  elements  a systematic  history,  only  to  be 
destroyed  again,  sooner  or  later,  by  some  Niebuhr,  Grote,  or  Lewis.” 

“ It  is  yet  too  early,”  says  Bandelier,2  “ to  establish  a definite  chronology, 
running  farther  back  from  the  Conquest  than  two  centuries,3  and  even 
within  that  period  but  very  few  dates  have  been  satisfactorily  fixed.” 

Such  are  the  conditions  of  the  story  which  it  is  the  purpose  of  this  chap- 
ter to  tell. 

We  have,  to  begin  with,  as  in  other  history,  the  recognition  of  a race 
of  giants,  convenient  to  hang  legends  on,  and  accounted  on  all  hands  to  have 
been  occupants  of  the  country  in  the  dimmest  past,  so  that  there  is  nothing 
back  of  them.  Who  they  were,  whence  they  came,  and  what  stands  for 
their  descendants  after  we  get  down  to  what  in  this  pre-Spanish  history  we 
rather  presumptuously  call  historic  ground,  is  far  from  clear.  If  we  had 
the  easy  faith  of  the  native  historian  Ixtlilxochitl,  we  should  believe  that 
these  gigantic  Quinames,  or  Quinametin,  were  for  the  most  part  swallowed 
up  in  a great  convulsion  of  nature,  and  it  was  those  who  escaped  which  the 
Olmecs  and  Tlascalans  encountered  in  entering  the  country.4  If  all  this 
means  anything,  which  may  well  be  doubted,  it  is  as  likely  as  not  that  these 
giants  were  the  followers  of  a demi-god,  Votan,5  who  came  from  over-sea  to 


1 Chips  from  a German  Workshop , i.  327. 

2 A rchcEological  Tour,  p.  202. 

3 The  earliest  fixed  date  for  the  founding 
of  Tenochtitlan  (Mexico  city)  is  1325.  Bras- 
seur  tells  us  that  Carlos  de  Sigiienza  y Gongora 
made  the  first  chronological  table  of  ancient 
Mexican  dates,  which  was  used  by  Boturini,  and 
was  improved  by  Leon  y Gama,  — the  same 
which  Bustamante  has  inserted  in  his  edition  of 
Gomara.  Gallatin  (Amer.  Ethnol.  Soc.  Trans.,  i.) 
gave  a composite  table  of  events  by  dates  be- 
fore the  Conquest,  which  is  followed  in  Brantz 

Mayer’s  Mexico  as  it  was,  i.  97.  Ed.  Madier  de 

Montjau,  in  his  Chronologic  hilroglyphico-phone- 


tique  dcs  Rois  Asteques  de  1352  h 1322,  takes 
issue  with  Ramirez  on  some  points. 

4 Bancroft  (v.  199)  gives  references  to  those 
writers  who  have  discussed  this  question  of  gi- 
ants. Bandelier’s  references  are  more  in  detail 
(Arch.  Tour,  p.  201).  Short  (p.  233)  borrows 
largely  the  list  in  Bancroft.  The  enumeration 
includes  nearly  all  the  old  writers.  Acosta  finds 
confirmation  in  bones  of  incredible  largeness, 
often  found  in  his  day,  and  then  supposed  to  be 
human.  Modern  zoologists  say  they  were  those 
of  the  Mastodon.  Howarth,  Mammoth  and  the 
Flood,  297. 

5 See  Native  Races,  ii.  117  ; v.  24,  27. 


134 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


America,1  found  it  peopled,  established  a government  in  Xibalba,  — if  such 
a place  ever  existed,  — with  the  germs  of  Maya  if  not  of  other  civilizations, 
whence,  by  migrations  during  succeeding  times,  the  Votanites  spread  north 
and  occupied  the  Mexican  plateau,  where  they  became  degenerate,  doubt- 
less, if  they  deserved  the  extinction  which  we  are  told  was  in  store  for 
them.  But  they  had  an  alleged  chronicler  for  their  early  days,  the  writer 
of  the  Book  of  Votan,  written  either  by  the  hero  himself  or  by  one  of  his 
descendants,  — eight  or  nine  generations  in  the  range  of  authorship  mak- 
ing little  difference  apparently.  That  this  narrative  was  known  to  Fran- 
cisco Nunez  de  la  Vega2  would  seem  to  imply  that  somebody  at  that  time 
had  turned  it  into  readable  script  out  of  the  unreadable  hieroglyphics,  while 
the  disguises  of  the  Spanish  tongue,  perhaps,  as  Bancroft3  suggests,  may 
have  saved  it  from  the  iconoclastic  zeal  of  the  priests.  When,  later,  Ramon 
de  Ordonez  had  the  document, ; — perhaps  the  identical  manuscript,  — it  con- 
sisted of  a few  folios  of  quarto  paper,  and  was  written  in  Roman  script  in 
the  Tzendal  tongue,  and  was  inspected  by  Cabrera,  who  tells  us  something 
of  its  purport  in  his  Tcatro  critico  Americano,  while  Ramon  himself  was  at 
the  same  time  using  it  in  his  Historia  del  Cielo  y de  la  Tierra.  It  was  from 
a later  copy  of  this  last  essay,  the  first  copy  being  unknown,  that  the  Abbe 
Brasseur  de  Bourbourg  got  his  knowledge  of  what  Ramon  had  derived  from 
the  Votan  narrative,  and  which  Brasseur  has  given  us  in  several  of  his 
books.4  That  there  was  a primitive  empire  — Votanic,  if  you  please  — 
seems  to  some  minds  confirmed  by  other  evidences  than  the  story  of  Votan  ; 
and  out  of  this  empire  — to  adopt  a European  nomenclature — have  come, 
as  such  believers  say,  after  its  downfall  somewhere  near  the  Christian  era, 
and  by  divergence,  the  great  stocks  of  people  called  Maya,  Quiche,  and 
Nahua,  inhabiting  later,  and  respectively,  Yucatan,  Guatemala,  and  Mex- 
ico. This  is  the  view,  if  we  accept  the  theory  which  Bancroft  has  prom- 
inently advocated,  that  the  migrations  of  the  Nahuas  were  from  the  south 
northward,5  and  that  this  was  the  period  of  the  divergence,  eighteen  cen- 
turies ago  or  more,  of  the  great  civilizing  stocks  of  Mexico  and  of  Central 
America.6  We  fail  to  find  so  early  a contact  of  these  two  races,  if,  on  the 
other  hand,  we  accept  the  old  theory  that  the  migrations  which  established 


1 Sometimes  it  is  said  they  came  from  the 
Antilles,  or  beyond,  easterly,  and  that  an  off- 
shoot of  the  same  people  appeared  to  the  early 
French  explorers  as  the  Natchez  Indians.  We 
have,  of  course,  offered  to  us  a choice  of  theories 
in  the  belief  that  the  Maya  civilization  came 
from  the  westward  by  the  island  route  from 
Asia.  This  misty  history  is  nothing  without 
alternatives,  and  there  are  a plenty  of  writers 
who  dogmatize  about  them. 

2 Constituciones  diocesanas  del  obispado  de  Chi- 
appas  (Rome,  1702). 

3 Nat.  Races,  v.  160. 

4 Hist.  Nations  Civil  isles,  i.  37,  150,  etc.  Po- 

pul  Vuh,  introd.,  sec.  v.  Bancroft  relates  the 

Votan  myth,  with  references,  in  Nat.  Races,  iii. 


450.  Brasseur  identifies  the  Votanites  with  the 
Colhuas,  as  the  builders  of  Palenque,  the  found- 
ers of  Xibalba,  and  thinks  a branch  of  them 
wandered  south  to  Peru.  There  are  some  sto- 
ries of  even  pre-Votan  days,  under  Igh  and 
Imox.  Cf.  H.  De  Charency’s  “ Myth  d’lmos,” 
in  the  Annales  de  philosophic  Chretienne,  1872- 
73,  and  references  in  Bancroft,  v.  164,  231. 

5 Native  Races,  ii.  121,  etc. 

6 Bancroft  (v.  236)  points  to  Bradford,  Squier, 
Tylor,  Viollet-le-Duc,  Bartlett,  and  Muller,  with 
Brasseur  in  a qualified  way,  as  in  the  main  agree- 
ing in  this  early  disjointing  of  the  Nahua  stock, 
by  which  the  Maya  was  formed  through  sepa- 
ration from  the  older  race. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


135 


the  Toltec  and  Aztec  powers  were  from  the  north  southward,1  through 
three  several  lines,  as  is  sometimes  held,  one  on  each  side  of  the  Rocky 
Mountains,  with  a third  following  the  coast.  In  this  way  such  advocates 
trace  the  course  of  the  Olmecs,  who  encountered  the  giants,  and  later  of  the 
Toltecs. 

That  the  Votanic  peoples  or  some  other  ancient  tribes  were  then  a dis- 
tinct source  of  civilization,  and  that  Palenque  may  even  be  Xibalba,  or  the 
Nachan,  which  Votan  founded,  is  a belief  that  some  archaeologists  find 
the  evidence  of  in  certain  radical  differences  in  the  Maya  tongues  and  in 
the  Maya  ruins.2 

In  the  Quiche  traditions,  as  preserved  in  the  Popul  Vuh , and  in  the 
Annals  of  the  Cakchiquels,  we  likewise  go  back  into  mistiness  and  into  the 
inevitable  myths  which  give  the  modern  comparative  mythologists  so  much 
comfort  and  enlightenment;  but  Bancroft3  and  the  rest  get  from  all  this 
nebulousness,  as  was  gotten  from  the  Maya  traditions,  that  there  was  a 
great  power  at  Xibalba,4  — if  in  Central  America  anywhere  that  place  may 
have  been,  — which  was  overcome  5 when  from  Tulan6  went  out  migrating 
chiefs,  who  founded  the  Quiche-Cakchiquel  peoples  of  Guatemala,  while 
others,  the  Yaqui, — very  likely  only  traders,  — went  to  Mexico,  and  still 
others  went  to  Yucatan,  thus  accounting  for  the  subsequent  great  centres 
of  aboriginal  power  — if  we  accept  this  view. 

As  respects  the  traditions  of  the  more  northern  races,  there  is  the  same 
choice  of  belief  and  alternative  demonstration.  The  Olmecs,  the  earliest 
Nahua  comers,  are  sometimes  spoken  of  as  sailing  from  Florida  and  land- 
ing on  the  coast  at  what  is  now  Panuco,  whence  they  travelled  to  Guate- 
mala,7 and  finally  settled  in  Tamoanchan,  and  offered  their  sacrifices  farther 
north  at  Teotihuacan.8  This  is  very  likely  the  Votan  legend  suited  to  the 
more  northern  region,  and  if  so,  it  serves  to  show,  unless  we  discard  the 
whole  theory,  how  the  Votanic  people  had  scattered.  The  other  principal 
source  of  our  suppositions  — for  we  can  hardly  call  it  knowledge  — of  these 
times  is  the  Codex  Chimalpopoca , of  which  there  is  elsewhere  an  account,9 


1 Enforced,  for  instance,  by  one  of  the  best  of 
the  later  Mexican  writers,  Orozco  y Berra,  in  his 
Geografia  de  las  lenguas  y Carta  Etlinografica  de 
Mixico  (Mexico,  1865). 

2 Tylor,  Anahuac,  189,  and  his  Early  Hist. 
Mankind,  184.  Orozco  y Berra,  Gcog.,  124.  Ban- 
croft, v.  169,  note.  The  word  Maya  was  first 
heard  by  Columbus  in  his  fourth  voyage,  1503-4. 
We  sometimes  find  it  written  Mayab.  It  is 
usual  to  class  ^he  people  of  Yucatan,  and  even 
the  Quiche-Cakchiquels  of  Guatemala  and  those 
of  Nicaragua,  under  the  comprehensive  term  of 
Maya,  as  distinct  from  the  Nahua  people  farther 
north. 

8 Hat.  Races,  v.  186. 

4 Brinton,  with  his  view  of  myths,  speaks  of 

the  attempt  of  the  Abbe  Brasseur  to  make  Xi- 

balba an  ancient  kingdom,  with  Palenque  as  its 


capital,  as  utterly  unsupported  and  wildly  hypo- 
thetical {Myths,  251). 

6  Perhaps  by  Gucumatz  (who  is  identified  by 
some  with  Quetzalcoatl),  leading  the  Tzequiles, 
who  are  said  to  have  appeared  from  somewhere 
during  one  of  Votan’s  absences,  and  to  have 
grown  into  power  among  the  Chanes,  or  Votan’s 
people,  till  they  made  Tulan,  where  they  lived, 
too  powerful  for  the  Votanites.  Bancroft  (v. 
187)  holds  this  view  against  Brasseur. 

6 Perhaps  Ococingo,  or  Copan,  as  Bancroft 
conjectures  (v.  187). 

7 As  Sahagun  calls  it,  meaning,  as  Bancroft 
suggests,  Tabasco. 

8 Short  (p.  248)  points  out  that  the  linguistic 
researches  of  Orozco  y Berra  ( Geografia  de  las 
Lenguas  de  Mexico,  1-76)  seem  to  confirm  this. 

9 See  p.  158. 


136 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


and  from  it  we  can  derive  much  the  same  impressions,  if  we  are  disposed  to 
sustain  a preconceived  notion. 

The  periods  and  succession  of  the  races  whose  annals  make  up  the  his- 
tory of  what  we  now  call  Mexico,  prior  to  the  coming  of  the  Spaniards,  are 
confused  and  debatable.  Whether  under  the  name  of  Chichimecs  we  are  to 
understand  a distinct  people,  or  a varied  and  conglomerate  mass  of  people, 
which,  in  a generic  way,  we  might  call  barbarians,  is  a question  open  to 
discussion.1  There  is  no  lack  of  names2  to  be  applied  to  the  tribes  and 
bands  which,  according  to  all  accounts,  occupied  the  Mexican  territory  pre- 
vious to  the  sixth  century.  Some  of  them  were  very  likely  Nahua  fore- 
runners 3 of  the  subsequent  great  influx  of  that  race,  like  the  Olmecs  and 
Xicalancas,  and  may  have  been  the  people  “ from  the  direction  of  Florida,” 
of  whom  mention  has  been  made.  Others,  as  some  say,  were  eddies  of  those 
populous  waves  which,  coming  by  the  north  from  Asia,  overflowed  the 
Rocky  Mountains,  and  became  the  builders  of  mounds  and  the  later  peoples 
of  the  Mississippi  Valley,4  passed  down  the  trend  of  the  Rocky  Mountains, 
and  built  cliff-houses  and  pueblos,  or  streamed  into  the  table-land  of  Mex- 
ico. This  is  all  conjecture,  perhaps  delusion,  but  may  be  as  good  a suppo- 
sition as  any,  if  we  agree  to  the  northern  theory,  as  Nadaillac5  does,  but  not 
so  tenable,  if,  with  the  contrary  Bancroft,6  we  hold  rather  that  they  came 
from  the  south.  We  can  turn  from  one  to  the  other  of  these  theorists  and 
agree  with  both,  as  they  cite  their  evidences.  On  the  whole,  a double  com- 
pliance is  better  than  dogmatism.  It  is  one  thing  to  lose  one’s  way  in  this 
labyrinth  of  belief,  and  another  to  lose  one’s  head. 


1 Kirk  says  (Prescott’s  Mexico ) : “Confusion 
arises  from  the  name  of  Chichimec,  originally 
that  of  a single  tribe,  and  subsequently  of  its 
many  offshoots,  being  also  used  to  designate  suc- 
cessive hordes  of  whatever  race.”  Some  have 
seen  in  the  Waiknas  of  the  Mosquito  Coast,  and 
in  the  Caribs  generally,  descendants  of  these  Chi- 
chimecs who  have  kept  to  their  old  social  level. 
The  Caribs,  on  other  authority,  came  originally 
from  the  stock  of  the  Tupis  and  Guaranis,  who 
occupied  the  region  south  of  the  Amazon,  and 
in  Columbus’s  time  they  were  scattered  in  Da- 
rien and  Honduras,  along  the  northern  regions 
of  South  America,  and  in  some  of  the  Antilles 
(Von  Martius,  Beitrdge  zur  Ethnographic  und 
Sprachenkunde  Amerika's  zumal  Brasiliens, 
Leipzig,  1867).  Bancroft  (ii.  126)  gives  the 
etymology  of  Chichimec  and  of  other  tribal  des- 
ignations. Cf.  Buschmann’s  Ueber  die  Azteki- 
schen  Ortsnamen  (Berlin,  1853).  Bandelier  (Ar- 
chccol.  Tour , 200;  Peabody  Mus.  Repts.,  ii.  393! 
says  he  fails  to  discover  in  the  word  anything 
more  than  a general  term,  signifying  a savage,  a 
hunter,  or  a warrior,  Chichimecos,  applied  to 
roving  tribes.  Brasseur  says  that  Mexican  tra- 
dition applies  the  term  Chichimecs  generically 
to  the  first  occupants  of  the  New  World. 

2 These  names  wander  and  exchange  conso- 


nants provokingly,  and  it  may  be  enough  to  give 
alphabetically  a list  comprised  of  those  in  Prich- 
ard (Nat.  Hist.  Man ) and  Orozco  y Berra  ( Geo- 
grafia ),  with  some  help  from  Gallatin  in  the 
American  Ethno.  Soc.  Trans.,  i.,  and  other 
groupers  of  the  ethnological  traces  : Chinantecs, 
Chatinos,  Cohuixcas,  Chontales,  Colhuas,  Coras, 
Cuitatecs,  Chichimecs,  Cuextecas  (Guaxtecas, 
Huastecs),  Mazetecs,  Mazahuas,  Michinacas, 
Miztecs,  Nonohualcas,  Olmecs,  Otomis,  Papa- 
bucos,  Quinames,  Soltecos,  Totonacs,  Triquis, 
Tepanecs,  Tarascos,  Xicalancas,  Zapotecs.  It 
is  not  unlikely  the  same  people  may  be  here 
mentioned  under  different  names.  The  diversity 
of  opinions  respecting  the  future  of  these  vapory 
existences  is  seen  in  Bancroft’s  collation  (v. 
202).  Torquemada  tells  us  about  all  that  we 
know  of  the  Totonacs,  who  claim  to  have  been 
the  builders  of  Teotihuacan.  Bancroft  gives  ref- 
erences (v.  204)  for  the  Totonaqs,  (p.  206)  for 
the  Otomis,  (p.  207)  for  the  Mistecs  and  Zapo- 
tecs, and  (p.  208)  for  the  Huastecs. 

3 Bancroft,  ii.  97.  Brasseur,  Nat.  Civ.,  i.  ch. 
4,  and  his  Palenque,  ch.  3. 

4 Called  Huehue-Tlapallan,  as  Brasseur  would 
have  it. 

6 Following  Motolinia  and  other  early  writers. 

6 A Tative  Races,  v.  219,  616. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


137 


It  was  the  Olmecs  who  found  the  Quinames,  or  giants,  near  Puebla  and 
Cholula,  and  in  the  end  overcame  them.  The  Olmecs  built,  according  to 
one  story,  the  great  pyramid  of  Cholula,1  and  it  was  they  who  received 
the  great  Quetzalcoatl  from  across  the  sea,  a ^white-bearded  man,  as  the 
legends  went,  who  was  benign  enough,  in  the  stories  told  of  him,  to  make 
the  later  Spaniards  think,  when  they  heard  them,  that  he  was  no  other  than 
the  Christian  St.  Thomas  on  his  missions.  When  the  Spaniards  finally  in- 
duced the  inheritors  of  the  Olmecs’  power  to  worship  Quetzalcoatl  as  a 
beneficent  god,  his  temple  soon  topped  the  mound  at  Cholula.2  We  have 
seen  that  the  great  Nahua  occupation  of  the  Mexican  plateau,  at  a period 
somewhere  from  the  fourth  to  the  seventh  century,3  was  preceded  by 
some  scattered  tribal  organizations  of  the  same  stock,  which  had  at  an 
early  date  mingled  with  the  primitive  peoples  of  this  region.  We  have 
seen  that  there  is  a diversity  of  opinion  as  to  the  country  from  which  they 
came,  whether  from  the  north  or  south.  A consideration  of  this  question 
involves  the  whole  question  of  the  migration  of  races  in  these  pre-Colum- 
bian days,  since  it  is  the  coming  and  going  of  peoples  that  form  the  basis 
of  all  its  history. 

In  the  study  of  these  migrations,  we  find  no  more  unanimity  of  inter- 
pretation than  in  other  questions  of  these  early  times.4  The  Nahua  peoples 
(Toltecs,  Aztecs,  Mexicans,  or  what  you  will),  according  to  the  prevalent 
views  of  the  early  Spanish  writers,  came  by  successive  influxes  from  the 
north  or  northwest,  and  from  a remote  place  called  Tollan,  Tula,  Tlapallan, 
Huehue-Tlapallan,  as  respects  the  Toltec  group,5  and  called  Aztlan  as 


1 Bandelier,  A rcheeol.  Tour , 253. 

2 Kingsborough,  ix.  206,  460;  Veytia,  i.  155, 
163.  Of  the  Quetzalcoatl  myth  there  are  refer- 
ences elsewhere.  P.  J.  J.  Valentini  has  made 
a study  of  the  early  Mexican  ethnology  and  his- 
tory in  his  “ Olmecas  and  Tultecas,”  translated 
by  S.  Salisbury,  Jr.,  and  printed  in  the  Atner. 
Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  Oct.  21, 1882.  On  Quetzalcoatl 
in  Cholula,  see  Torquemada,  translated  in  Ban- 
croft, iii.  258. 

3 This  wide  difference  covers  intervening  cen- 
turies, each  of  which  has  its  advocates.  Short 
carries  their  coming  back  to  the  fourth  century 
(p.  245),  but  Clavigero’s  date  of  a.  d.  ^44  is  more 
commonly  followed.  Veytia  makes  it  the  sev- 
enth century.  Bancroft  (v.  211,  214)  notes  the 
diversity  of  views. 

i Bancroft  (v.  322)  in  a long  note  collates  the 
different  statements  of  the  routes  and  sojourns 
in  this  migration.  Cf.  Short,  p.  259. 

u Cf.  Kirk  in  Prescott,  i.  10.  It  must  be  con- 
fessed that  it  is  rather  in  the  domain  of  myth 
than  of  history  that  we  must  place  all  that  has 
been  written  about  the  scattering  of  the  Toltec 
people  at  Babel  (Bancroft,  v.  19),  and  their 
finally  reaching  Huehue-Tlapallan,  wherever 
that  may  have  been.  The  view  long  prevalent 
about  this  American  starting-point  of  the  Na- 


huas,  Toltecs,  or  whatever  designation  may  be 
given  to  the  beginners  of  this  myth  and  history, 
placed  it  in  California,  but  some  later  writers 
think  it  worth  while  to  give  it  a geographical 
existence  in  the  Mississippi  Valley,  and  to  asso- 
ciate it  in  some  vague  way  with  the  mound- 
builders  and  their  works  (Short,  No.  Atner.  of 
Antiq.,  251,  253).  There  is  some  confusion  be- 
tween Huehue-Tlapallan  of  this  story  and  the 
Tlapallan  noticed  in  the  Spanish  conquest  time, 
which  was  somewhere  in  the  Usumacinta  region, 
and  if  we  accept  Tollan,  Tullan,  or  Tula  as  a 
form  of  the  name,  the  confusion  is  much  in- 
creased (Short,  pp.  2x7-220).  Bancroft  (v.  214) 
says  there  is  no  sufficient  data  to  determine  the 
position  of  Huehue-Tlapallan,  but  he  thinks  “ the 
evidence,  while  not  conclusive,  favors  the  south 
rather  than  the  north  ” (p.  216).  The  truth  is, 
about  these  conflicting  views  of  a northern  or 
southern  origin,  pretty  much  as  Kirk  puts  it 
(Prescott,  i.  18) : “ All  that  can  be  said  with  con- 
fidence is,  that  neither  of  the  opposing  theo- 
ries rests  on  a secure  and  sufficient  basis.”  The 
situation  of  Huehue-Tlapallan  and  Aztlan  is 
very  likely  one  and  the  same  question,  as  look- 
ing to  what  was  the  starting-point  of  all  the 
Nahua  migrations,  extending  over  a thousand 
years. 


138  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 

respects  the  Aztec  or  Mexican.  When,  by  settlement  after  settlement,  each 
migratory  people  pushed  farther  south,  they  finally  reached  Central  Mexico. 
This  sequence  of  immigration  seems  to  be  agreed  upon,  but  as  to  where 
their  cradle  was  and  as  to  what  direction  their  line  of  progress  took,  there 
is  a diversity  of  opinion  as  widely  separated  as  the  north  is  from  the  south. 
The  northern  position  and  the  southern  direction  is  all  but  universally 
accepted  among  the  early  Spanish  writers 1 and  their  followers,2  while  it  is 
claimed  by  others  that  the  traditions  as  preserved  point  to  the  south 
as  the  starting-point.  Cabrera  took  this  view.  Brasseur  sought  to  recon- 
cile conflicting  tradition  and  Spanish  statement  by  carrying  the  line  of 
migration  from  the  south  with  a northerly  sweep,  so  that  in  the  end  Ana- 
huac  would  be  entered  from  the  north,  with  which  theory  Bancroft 3 is 
inclined  to  agree.  Aztlan,  as  well  as  Huehue-Tlapallan,  by  those  who 
support  the  northern  theory,  has  been  placed  anywhere  from  the  Califor- 
nia peninsula4  within  a radius  that  sweeps  through  Wisconsin  and  strikes 
the  Atlantic  at  Florida.5 


1 Bancroft,  v.  217. 

2 Torquemada,  Boturini,  Humboldt,  Brasseur, 
Charnay,  Short,  etc. 

3 Nat.  Races  (v.  222). 

4 In  support  of  the  California  location,  Busch- 
mann,  in  his  Ueber  die  Spuren  der  Aztekischen 
Sprache  im  nordlichen  Mexico  und  hokeren  Ame- 
rikanischen  Norden  (Berlin,  1854),  finds  traces  of 
the  Mexican  tongue  in  those  of  the  recent  Cali- 
fornia Indians.  Linguistic  resemblances  to  the 
Aztec,  even  so  far  north  as  Nootka,  have  been 
traced,  but  later  philologists  deny  the  inferences 
of  relationship  drawn  from  such  similarity  (Ban- 
croft, iii.  p.  612).  The  linguistic  confusion  in 
aboriginal  California  is  so  great  that  there  is  a 
wide  field  for  tracing  likenesses  {Ibid.  iii.  635). 
In  the  California  State  Mining  Bureau,  Bulletin 
no.  1 (Sacramento,  1888),  Winslow  Anderson 
gives  a description  of  some  desiccated  human 
remains  found  in  a sealed  cave,  which  are  sup- 
posed to  be  Aztec.  There  are  slight  resem- 
blances to  the  Aztec  in  the  Shoshone  group  of 
languages  (Bancroft,  iii.  666),  and  the  same  au- 
thor arranges  all  that  has  been  said  to  connect 
the  Mexican  tongue  with  those  of  New  Mexico 
and  neighboring  regions  (iii.  664).  Buschmann, 
who  has  given  particular  attention  to  tracing  the 
Aztec  connections  at  the  north,  finds  nothing  to 
warrant  anything  more  than  casual  admixtures 
with  other  stocks  (Die  Lautverdnderuna  Azteki- 
scher  Worter,  Berlin,  1855,  and  Die  Spuren  der 
Aztekischen  Sprachen,  Berlin,  1859).  See  Short 
(p.  487)  for  a summary. 

6 Bancroft  (v.  305)  cites  the  diverse  views ; so 
does  Short  to  some  extent  (pp.  246,  258,  etc.). 
Cf.  Brinton’s  Address  on  “ Where  was  Aztlan  ? ” 
p.  6;  Short,  486,  490;  Nadaillac,  284;  Wilson’s 
Prehistoric  Man,  i.  327. 


Brinton  (Myths  of  the  New  World,  etc.,  89; 
Amer.  Hero.  Myths,  92)  holds  that  Aztlan  is  a 
name  wholly  of  mythical  purport,  which  it  would 
be  vain  to  seek  on  the  terrestrial  globe.  This 
cradle  region  of  the  Nahuas  sometimes  appears 
as  the  Seven  Caves  (Chicomoztoc),  and  Duran 
places  them  “in  Teoculuacan,  otherwise  called 
Aztlan,  a country  toward  the  north  and  con- 
nected with  Florida.”  The  Seven  Caves  were 
explained  by  Sahagun  as  a valley,  by  Clavigero 
as  a city,  by  Schoolcraft  and  others  as  simply 
seven  boats  in  which  the  first  comers  came  from 
Asia;  Brasseur  makes  them  and  Aztlan  the 
same ; others  find  them  to  be  the  seven  cities  of 
Cibola,  — so  enumerates  Brinton  (Myths,  227), 
who  thinks  that  the  seven  divisions  of  the  Na- 
huas sprung  from  the  belief  in  the  Seven  Caves, 
and  had  in  reality  no  existence. 

Gallatin  has  followed  out  the  series  of  migra- 
tions in  the  Amer.  Ethnol.  Soc.  Trans.,  i.  162. 
Dawson,  Fossil  Men  (ch.  3),  gives  his  compre- 
hensive views  of  the  main  directions  of  these 
early  migrations.  Brasseur  follows  the  Nahuas 
(Popul  Vuh,  introd.,  sect.  ix.).  Winchell  (Pre- 
Adamites)  thinks  the  general  tendency  was  from 
north  to  south.  Morgan  finds  the  origin  of  the 
Mexican  tribes  in  New  Mexico  and  in  the  San 
Juan  Valley  (Peabody  Mus.  Rept.,  xii.  353.  Cf. 
his  article  in  the  North  Am.  Rev.,  Oct.,  1869). 
Humboldt  ( Views  of  Nature,  207)  touches  the 
Aztec  wanderings. 

There  are  two  well-known  Aztec  migration 
maps,  first  published  in  F.  G.  Carreri’s  Giro 
del  Mondo  ; in  English  as  “Voyage  round  the 
world,”  in  Churchill’s  Voyages,  vol.  iv.,  concern- 
ing which  see  Bancroft,  ii.  543;  iii.  68,69;  Short. 
262,431,  433;  Prescott,  iii.  364,382.  Orozco  y 
Berra  (Hist.  Antiq.  de  Mexico,  iii.  61)  says  that 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


139 


The  advocates  of  the  southern  starting-point  of  these  migrations  have 
been  comparatively  few  and  of  recent  prominence  ; chief  among  them  are 
Squier  and  Bancroft.1 


With  the  appearance  of  a people,  which,  for  want  of  a better  designation, 
are  usually  termed  Toltecs,  on  the  Mexican  table-land  in  the  sixth  century 
or  thereabouts,2  we  begin  the  early  history  of  Mexico,  so  far  as  we  can  make 
any  deductions  from  the  semi-mythical  records  and  traditions  which  the 
Spaniards  or  the  later  aborigines  have  preserved  for  us.  This  story  of  the 
Nahua  occupation  of  Anahuac  is  one  of  strife  and  shifting  vassalage,  with 
rivalries  and  uprisings  of  neighboring  and  kindred  tribes,  going  on  for  cen- 
turies. While  the  more  advanced  portion  of  the  Nahuas  in  Anahuac  were 
making  progress  in  the  arts,  that  division  of  the  same  stock  which  was 
living  beyond  such  influence,  and  without  the  bounds  of  Anahuac,  were 
looked  upon  rather  as  barbarians  than  as  brothers,  and  acquired  the  name 
which  had  become  a general  one  for  such  rougher  natures,  Chichimec. 
It  is  this  Chichimec  people  under  some  name  or  other  who  are  always 
starting  up  and  overturning  something.  At  one  time  they  unite  with  the 
Colhuas  and  found  Colhuacan,  and  nearly  subjugate  the  lake  region.  Then 
the  Toltec  tarriers  at  Huehue-Tlapallan  come  boldly  to  the  neighborhood 
of  the  Chichimecs  and  found  Tollan  ; and  thus  they  turn  a wandering  com- 
munity into  what,  for  want  of  a better  name,  is  called  a monarchy.  They 
strengthened  its  government  by  an  alliance  with  the  Chichimecs,3  and 
placed  their  seat  of  power  at  Colhuacan. 


these  maps  follow  one  another,  and  are  not  dif- 
ferent records  of  the  same  progress.  Humboldt 
(Vues,  etc.,  ii.  176)  gives  an  interpretation  of 
them  in  accordance  with  Sigiienza’s  views,  which 
is  the  one  usually  followed,  and  Bancroft  (v.  324) 
epitomizes  it.  Ramirez  says  that  the  copies 
reproduced  in  Humboldt,  Clavigero,  and  Kings- 
borough  are  not  so  correct  as  the  engraving 
given  in  Garcia  y Cubas’s  Atlas  geogr&fico,  esta- 
distico  e histSrico  de  la  Republica  Mejicana  (April, 
1858).  Bancroft  (ii.  544)  gives  it  as  reproduced 
by  Ramirez.  It  is  also  in  the  Mexican  edition 
of  Prescott,  and  in  Schoolcraft’s  Indian  Tribes. 
C£  Delafield’s  Inquiry  (N.  Y.,  1839)  and  Leon 
de  Rosny’s  Les  doc.  Icrits  de  I'atitiq.  Ambr. 
(Paris,  1882).  The  original  is  preserved  in 
the  Museo  Nacional  of  Mexico.  A palm-tree 
on  the  map,  near  Aztlan,  has  pointed  some  of 
the  arguments  in  favor  of  a southern  position 
for  that  place,  but  Ramirez  says  it  is  but  a part 
of  a hieroglyphic  name,  and  has  no  reference 
to  the  climate  of  Aztlan  (Short,  p.  266).  F.  Von 
Hellwald  printed  a paper  on  “ American  migra- 
tions,” with  notes  by  Professor  Henry,  in  the 
Smithsonian  Report,  1866,  pp.  328-345.  Short 
defines  as  “ altogether  the  most  enlightened 
treatment  of  the  subject”  the  paper  of  John 
H.  Becker,  “ Migrations  des  Nahuas,”  in  the 
Compte  rendu,  Congrls  des  Ambricanistes  (Lux- 


embourg, 1877),  i.  325.  This  paper  finds  an 
identification  of  the  Tulan  Zuivaof  the  Quiches, 
the  Huehue-Tlapallan  of  the  Toltecs,  the  Ama- 
quemecan  of  the  Chichimecs,  and  the  Oztotlan 
(Aztlan)  of  the  Aztecs  in  the  valleys  of  the  Rio 
Grande  del  Norte  and  Rio  Colorado,  as  was 
Morgan’s  view.  Short  (p.  249)  summarizes  his 
paper.  Bancroft  (v.  289)  shows  the  diversity 
of  views  respecting  Amaquemecan. 

1 Native  Races,  v.  167,  recapitulates  the  proofs 
against  the  northern  theory.  J.  R.  Bartlett,  Per- 
sonal Narrative,  ii.  283,  finds  no  evidence  for  it. 
The  successive  sites  of  their  sojourns  as  they 
passed  on  their  journeys  are  given  as  Tlapallan, 
Tlacutzin,  Tlapallanco,  Jalisco,  Atenco,  Iztach- 
nexuca,  Tollatzinco,  Tollan  or  Tula,  — the  last, 
says  Bancroft,  apparently  in  Chiapas.  If  there 
was  not  such  confusion  respecting  the  old  geog- 
raphy, these  names  might  decide  the  question. 

2 Writers  usually  place  the  beginnings  of  cred- 
ible history  at  about  this  period.  Bra*sseur  and 
the  class  of  writers  who  are  easily  lifted  on  their 
imagination  talk  about  traces  of  a settled  gov- 
ernment being  discernible  at  periods  which  they 
place  a thousand  years  before  Christ. 

3 References  in  Bancroft,  v.  247,  with  Bras- 
seur  for  the  main  dependence,  in  his  use  of  the 
Codex  Chimalpopoca  and  the  Memorial  de  Col- 
huacan. 


140 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Then  we  read  of  a power  springing  up  at  Tezcuco,  and  of  various  other 
events,  which  happened  or  did  not  happen,  according  as  you  believe  this  or 
the  other  chronicle.  The  run  of  many  of  the  stories  of  course  produces 
the  inevitable  and  beautiful  daughter,  and  the  bold  princess,  who  control 
many  an  event.  Then  there  is  a league  of  Colhuacan,  Otompan,  and  Tollan. 
Suddenly  appears  the  great  king  Quetzalcoatl,  — though  it  may  be  we  con- 
found him  with  the  divinity  of  that  name;  and  with  him,  to  perplex  mat- 
ters, comes  his  sworn  enemy  Huemac.  Quetzalcoatl’s  devoted  labors  to 
make  his  people  give  up  human  sacrifice  arrayed  the  priesthood  against 
him,  until  at  last  he  fell  before  the  intrigues  that  made  Huemac  succeed  in 
Tollan,  and  that  drove  his  luckless  rival  to  Cholula,  where  he  reigned  anew. 
Huemac  followed  him  and  drove  him  farther;  but  in  doing  so  he  gave  his 
enemies  in  Tollan  a chance  to  put  another  on  the  throne. 

Then  came  a season  of  peace  and  development,  when  Tollan  grew 
splendid.  Colhuacan  flourished  in  political  power,  and  Teotihuacan 1 and 
Cholula  were  the  religious  shrines  of  the  people.  But  at  last  the  end  was 
near. 

The  closing  century  of  the  Toltec  power  was  a frightful  one  for  broil, 
pestilence,  and  famine  among  the  people,  amours  and  revenge  in  the  great 
chieftain’s  household,  revolt  among  the  vassals  ; with  sorcery  rampant 
and  the  gods  angry  ; with  volcanoes  belching,  summers  like  a furnace,  and 
winters  like  the  pole  ; with  the  dreaded  omen  of  a rabbit,  horned  like  a deer, 
confronting  the  ruler,  while  rebel  forces  threatened  the  capital.  There 
was  also  civil  strife  within  the  gates,  phallic  worship  and  debauchery,  — all 
preceding  an  inundation  of  Chichimecan  hordes.  Thus  the  power  that 
had  flourished  for  several  hundred  years  fell,  — seemingly  in  the  latter  half 
of  the  eleventh  century.2  The  remnant  that  was  left  of  the  desolated 
people  went  hither  and  thither,  till  the  fragments  were  absorbed  in  the 
conquerors,  or  migrated  to  distant  regions  south.3 

Whether  the  term  Toltec  signified  a nation,  or  only  denoted  a dynasty, 
is  a question  for  the  archaeologists  to  determine.  The  general  opinion 
heretofore  has  been  that  they  were  a distinct  race,  of  the  Nahua  stock,  how- 
ever, and  that  they  came  from  the  north.  The  story  which  has  been  thus 
far  told  of  their  history  is’ the  narrative  of  Ixtlilxochitl,  and  is  repeated 
by  Veytia,  Clavigero,  Prescott,  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  Orozco  y Berra, 


1 Charnay  (Eng.  trans.,  ch.  8 and  9)  calls  it  a 
rival  city  of  Tula  or  Tollan,  rebuilt  by  the  Chi- 
chimecs  on  the  ruins  of  a Toltec  city. 

2 If  one  wants  the  details  of  all  this,  he  can 
read  it  in  Veytia,  Brasseur  (Nat.  Civiltsles  and 
Palenqul,  "ch.  viii.),  and  Bancroft,  the  latter  giv- 
ing references  (v.  285). 

3 It  is  frequently  stated  that  there  was  a seg- 
regated migration  to  Central  America.  Bancroft 
(v.  168,  285),  who  codates  the  authorities,  finds 
nothing  of  the  kind  implied.  He  thinks  the 
mass  remained  in  Anahuac.  The  old  view  as 
expressed  by  Prescott  (i.  14)  was  that  “much 


the  greater  number  probably  spread  over  the 
region  of  Central  America  and  the  neighboring 
isles,  and  the  traveller  now  speculates  on  the 
majestic  ruins  of  Mitla  and  Palenque  as  possi- 
bly the  work  of  this  extraordinary  people.” 
Kirk,  as  Prescott’s  editor,  refers  to  the  labors 
of  Orozco  y Berra  ( Geografia  de  las  Lenguas  de 
Mexico , 122),  followed  by  Tylor,  Anahuac , 189) 
as  establishing  the  more  recent  view  that  this 
southern  architecture,  “ though  of  a far  higher 
grade,  was  long  anterior  to  the  Toltec  domin- 
ion.” 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


141 


Nadaillac,  and  the  later  compilers.  Sahagun  seems  to  have  been  the  first 
to  make  a distinct  use  of  the  name  Toltec,  and  Charency  in  his  paper  on 
Xibalba  finds  evidence  that  the  Toltecs  constituted  two  different  migra- 
tions, the  one  of  a race  that  was  straight-headed,  which  came  from  the 
northwest,  and  the  other  of  a flat -headed  people,  which  came  from  Florida. 

Brinton,  on  the  contrary,  finds  no  warrant  either  for  this  dual  migration, 
or  indeed  for  considering  the  Toltecs  to  be  other  than  a section  of  the 
same  race,  that  we  know  later  as  Aztecs  or  Mexicans.  This  sweeping 
denial  of  their  ethnical  independence  had  been  forestalled  by  Gallatin ; 1 
but  no  one  before  Brinton  had  made  it  a distinct  issue,  though  some 
writers  before  and  since  have  verged  on  his  views.2  Others,  like  Charnay, 
have  answered  Brinton’s  arguments,  and  defended  the  older  views.3  Ban- 
delier’s  views  connect  them  with  the  Maya  rather  than  with  the  Nahua 
stock,4  if,  as  he  thinks  may  be  the  case,  they  were  the  people  who  landed 
at  Panuco  and  settled  at  Tamoanchan,  the  Votanites,  as  they  are  sometimes 
called.  He  traces  back  to  Herrera  and  Torquemada  the  identification  for 
the  first  time  of  the  Toltecs  with  these  people.5  Bandelier’s  conclusions, 
however,  are  that  “ all  we  can  gather  about  them  with  safety  is,  that  they 
were  a sedentary  Indian  stock,  which  at  some  remote  period  settled  in  Cen- 
tral Mexico,”  and  that  “nothing  certain  is  known  of  their  language.”  6 


1 Atner.  Ethno.  Soc.  Trans.,  i. 

2 Bancroft  (v.  287)  says:  “ It  is  probable  that 
the  name  Toltec,  a title  of  distinction  rather 
than  a national  name,  was  never  applied  at  all 
to  the  common  people.” 

3 Brinton’s  main  statement  is  in  his  Were  the 
Toltecs  an  historic  nationality  ? Read  before  the 
American  Philosophical  Society,  Sept.  2,  1887 
(Phila.,  1887);  published  also  in  their  Proceed- 
ings, 1887,  jp.  229.  Cf.  also  Brinton’s  Amer. 
Hero.  Myths  (Phil.,  1882), p.  86,  where  he  throws 
discredit  on  the  existence  of  the  alleged  Toltec 
king  Quetzalcoatl  (whom  Sahagun  keeps  dis- 
tinct from  the  mythical  demi-god)  ; and  earlier, 
in  his  Myths  of  the  New  World  (p.  29),  he  had 
suggested  that  the  name  Toltec  might  have  “a 
merely  mythical  signification.”  Charnay,  who 
makes  the  Toltecs  aNahuan  tribe,  had  defended 
their  historical  status  in  a paper  on  “ La  Civili- 
sation Tolteque,”  in  the  Revue  d'  Ethnographic 
(iv.,  1885) ; and  again,  two  years  later,  in  the  same 
periodical,  he  reviewed  adversely  Brinton’s  argu- 
ments. (Cf.  Saturday  Review,  lxiii.  843.)  Otto 
Stoll,  in  his  Guatemala,  Reisen  und  Schilderungcn 
(Leipzig,  1886),  is  another  who  rejects  the  old 
theory. 

4 Archceol.  Tour,  253. 

6 Archceol.  Tour,  7.  Sahagun  identifies  the 
Toltecs  with  the  “giants,”  and  if  these  were  the 
degraded  descendants  of  the  followers  of  Votan, 
Sahagun  thus  earlier  established  the  same  iden- 
tity. 

6 Archceol.  Tour,  191.  The  fact  that  the 


names  which  we  associate  with  the  Toltecs  are 
Nahua,  only  means  that  Nahua  writers  have 
transmitted  them,  as  Bandelier  thinks.  Cf.  also 
Bandelier’s  citation  in  the  Peabody  Mus.  Reports, 
vol.  ii.  388,  where  he  speaks  of  our  information 
regarding  the  Toltecs  as  “limited  and  obscure.” 
He  thinks  it  beyond  question  that  they  were  Na- 
huas ; and  the  fact  that  their  division  of  time 
corresponds  with  the  system  found  in  Yucatan, 
Guatemala,  etc.,  with  other  evidences  of  myths 
and  legends,  leads  him  to  believe  that  the  abo- 
rigines of  more  southern  regions  were,  if  not  de- 
scendants, at  least  of  the  same  stock  with  the 
Toltecs,  and  that  we  are  justified  in  studying 
them  to  learn  what  the  Toltecs  were.  He  finds 
that  Veytia,  in  his  account  of  the  Toltecs,  beside 
depending  on  Sahagun  and  Torquemada,  finds  a 
chief  source  in  Ixtlilxochitl,  and  locates  Huehue- 
Tlapallan  in  the  north;  and  Veytia’s  statements 
reappear  in  Clavigero. 

The  best  narratives  of  the  Toltec  history  are 
those  in  Veytia,  Historia  Antigua  de  Mejico  (Mex- 
ico, 1806) ; Brasseur’s  Hist.  Nations  Civilisees 
(vol.  i. ),  and  his  introduction  to  his  Popul  Vuh; 
and  Bancroft  (v.  ch.  3 and  4) : but  we  must  look 
to  Ixtlilxochitl,  Torquemada,  Sahagun,  and  the 
others,  if  we  wish  to  study  the  sources.  In  such 
a study  we  shall  encounter  vexatious  problems 
enough.  It  is  practically  impossible  to  arrange 
chronologically  what  Ixtlilxochitl  says  that  he 
got  from  the  picture-writings  which  he  inter- 
preted. Bancroft  (v.  209)  does  the  best  he  can 
fo  give  it  a forced  perspicuity.  Wilson  (Prehis- 


142 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  desolation  of  Anahuac  as  the  Toltecs  fell  invited  a foreign  occupation, 
and  a remote  people  called  Chichimecs  1 — not  to  be  confounded  with  the 
primitive  barbarians  which  are  often  so  called  — poured  down  upon  the  coun- 
try. Just  how  long  after  the  Toltec  downfall  this  happened,  is  in  dispute  ;2 
but  within  a tew  years  evidently,  perhaps  within  not  many  months,  came 
the  rush  of  millions,  if  we  may  believe  the  big  stories  of  the  migration. 
They  surged  by  the  ruined  capital  of  the  Toltecs,  came  to  the  lake,  founded 
Xoloc  and  Tenayocan,  and  encountered,  as  they  spread  over  the  country, 
what  were  left  of  the  Toltecs,  who  secured  peace  by  becoming  vassals.  Not 
quite  so  humble  were  the  Colhuas  of  Colhuacan,  — not  to  be  confounded 
with  the  Acolhuas,  — who  were  the  most  powerful  section  of  the  Toltecs 
yet  left,  and  the  Chichimecs  set  about  crushing  them,  and  succeeded  in 
making  them  also  vassals.3  The  Chichimec  monarchs,  if  that  term  does 
not  misrepresent  them,  soon  formed  alliances  with  the  Tepanecs,  the  Oto- 
mis,  and  the  Acolhuas,  who  had  been  prominent  in  the  overthrow  of  the 
Toltecs,  and  all  the  invaders  profited  by  the  higher  organizations  and  arts 
which  these  tribes  had  preserved  and  now  imparted.  The  Chichimecs  also 
sought  to  increase  the  stability  of  their  power  by  marriages  with  the  noble 
Toltecs  still  remaining.  But  all  was  not  peace.  There  were  rebellions 
from  time  to  time  to  be  put  down  ; and  a new  people,  whose  future  they  did 
not  then  apprehend,  had  come  in  among  them  and  settled  at  Chapultepec. 
These  were  the  Aztecs,  or  Mexicans,  a part  of  the  great  Nahua  immigra- 
tion, but  as  a tribe  they  had  dallied  behind  the  others  on  the  way,  but  were 
now  come,  and  the  last  to  come.4 

Tezcuco  soon  grew  into  prominence  as  a vassal  power,5  and  upon  the  cap- 
ital city  many  embellishments  were  bestowed,  so  that  the  great  lord  of  the 
Chichimecs  preferred  it  to  his  own  Tenayocan,  which  gave  opportunity  for 
rebellious  plots  to  be  formed  in  his  proper  capital ; and  here  at  Tezcuco 
the  next  succeeding  ruler  preferred  to  reign,  and  here  he  became  isolated 
by  the  uprising  of  rebellious  nobles.  The  ensuing  war  was  not  simply  of 
side  against  side,  but  counter-revolutions  led  to  a confusion  of  tumults,  and 
petty  chieftains  set  themselves  up  against  others  here  and  there.  The 
result  was  that  Quinantzin,  who  had  lost  the  general  headship  of  the  coun- 
try, recovered  it,  and  finally  consolidated  his  power  to  a degree  surpassing 
all  his  predecessors. 


toric  Man , i.  245)  not  inaptly  says  : “ The  history 
of  the  Toltecs  and  their  ruined  edifices  stands 
on  the  border  line  of  romance  and  fable,  like 
that  of  the  ruined  builders  of  Carnac  and  Ave- 
bury.” 

1  Short  (page  255)  points  out  that  Bancroft 
unadvisedly  looks  upon  these  Chichimecs  as  of 
Nahua  stock,  according  to  the  common  belief. 
Short  thinks  that  Pimentel  ( Lenguas  indigenas 
de  Mexico , published  in  1862)  has  conclusively 
shown  that  the  Chichimecs  did  nut  originally 
speak  the  Nahua  tongue,  but  subsequently 
adopted  it.  Short  (page  256)  thinks,  after  col- 


lating the  evidence,  that  it  is  impossible  to  de- 
termine whence  or  how  they  came  to  Anahuac. 

2 Bancroft,  v.  292,  gives  the  different  views. 
Cf.  Kirk  in  Prescott,  i.  16. 

3 These  events  are  usually  one  thing  or 
another,  according  to  the  original  source  which 
you  accept,  as  Bancroft  shows  (v.  303).  The 
story  of  the  text  is  as  good  as  any,  and  is  in  the 
main  borne  out  by  the  other  narratives. 

4 Bancroft,  v.  308.  Cf.,  on  the  arrival  of  the 
Mexicans  in  the  valley,  Bandelier  (Peabody  Mus. 
Reports , ii.  398)  and  his  references. 

5 Prescott,  i.,  introduction  ch.  6,  tells  the  story 
of  their  golden  age. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


143 


CLAVIGERO’S  MEXICO*  (Ed.  of  1780,  vol.  iti.) 


* Cf.  the  map  in  Lucien  Biart’s  Les  Aztiques  (Paris,  1885).  Prescott  says  the  maps  in  Clavigero,  Lopez, 
and  Robertson  defy  “equally  topography  and  history.”  Cf.  note  on  plans  of  the  city  and  valley  in  Vol.  II. 
pp.  364,  369,  374,  to  which  may  be  added,  as  showing  diversified  views,  those  in  Stevens’s  Herrera  (London, 
1 740),  vol.  ii. ; Bordone’s  Libro  (1528) ; Icazbalceta’s  Coll,  de  docs.,  i.  390 ; and  the  Eng.  translation  of  Cortes’ 
despatches,  333. 


144 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Meanwhile  the  Aztecs  at  Chapultepec,  growing  arrogant,  provoked  their 
neighbors,  and  were  repressed  by  those  who  were  more  powerful.  But  they 
abided  their  time.  They  were  good  fighters,  and  the  Colhua  ruler  courted 


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CLAVIGERO’S  MAP*  (Ed.  of  1580,  vol.  i.) 


them  to  assist  him  in  his  maraudings,  and  thus  they  were  becoming  accus- 
tomed to  warfare  and  to  conquest,  and  were  giving  favors  to  be  repaid.  This 
intercourse,  whether  of  association  or  rivalry,  of  the  Colhuas  and  Mexicans 
(Aztecs),  was  continued  through  succeeding  periods,  with  a confusion  of 
dates  and  events  which  it  is  hard  to  make  clear.  There  was  mutual  distrust 
and  confidence  alternately,  and  it  all  ended  in  the  Aztecs  settling  on  an 
island  in  the  lake,  where  later  they  founded  Tenochtitlan,  or  Mexico.1  Here 

1 This  is  placed  A.  D.  1325.  Cf.  references  in  Bancroft  (v.  346). 

* Clavigero  speaks  of  his  map  “ per  servire  all  storia  antica  del  Messico.”  A map  of  the  Aztec  dominion 
just  before  the  Conquest  is  given  in  Ranking  (London,  1827).  See  note  in  Vol.  II.  p.  358. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


145 


THE  LAKE  OF  MEXICO* 

* A map  which  did  service  in  different  forms  in  various  books  about  Mexico  and  its  aboriginal  localities  in 
the  early  part  of  the  eighteenth  century.  It  is  here  taken  from  the  Voyages  de  Francois  Coreal  (Amsterdam, 
1722), 

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they  developed  those  bloody  rites  of  sacrifice  which  had  already  disgusted 
their  allies  and  neighbors. 

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VOL.  I. — 10 


146  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Meanwhile  the  powers  at  Colhuacan  and  Azcapuzalco  flourished  and 
repressed  uprisings,  and  out  of  all  the  strife  Tezozomoc  came  into  promi- 
nence with  his  Tepanecs,  and  amid  it  all  the  Aztecs,  siding  here  and  there, 
gained  territory.  With  all  this  occurring  in  different  parts  of  his  domin- 
ions, the  Chichimec  potentate  grew  stronger  and  stronger,  and  while  by  his 
countenance  the  old  Toltec  influences  more  and  more  predominated.  And 
so  it  was  a flourishing  government,  with  little  to  mar  its  prospects  but  the 
ambition  of  Tezozomoc,  the  Tepanec  chieftain,  and  the  rising  power  of  the 
Aztecs,  who  had  now  become  divided  into  Mexicans  and  Tlatelulcas,  The 
famous  ruler  of  the  Chichimecs,  Techotl,  died  in  A.  d.  1357,  and  the  young 
Ixtlilxochitl  took  his  power  with  all  its  emblems.  The  people  of  Tenochtit- 
lan,  or  their  rulers,  were  adepts  in  practising  those  arts  of  diplomacy  by 
which  an  ambitious  nation  places  itself  beside  its  superiors  to  secure  a sort 
of  reflected  consequence.  Thus  they  pursued  matrimonial  alliances  and 
other  acts  of  prudence.  Both  Tenochtitlan  and  its  neighbor  Tlatelulco  grew 
apace,  while  skilled  artisans  and  commercial  industries  helped  to  raise  them 
in  importance. 

The  young  Ixtlilxochitl  at  Tezcuco  was  not  so  fortunate,  and  it  soon 
looked  as  if  the  Tepanec  prince,  Tezozomoc,  was  only  waiting  an  opportu 
nity  to  rebel.  It  was  also  pretty  clear  that  he  would  have  the  aid  of  Mexico 
and  Tlatelulco,  and  that  he  would  succeed  in  securing  the  sympathy  of  many 
wavering  vassals  or  allies.  The  plans  of  the  Tepanec  chieftain  at  last 
ripened,  and  he  invaded  the  Tezcucan  territory  in  1415.  In  the  war  which 
followed,  Ixtlilxochitl  reversed  the  tide  and  invaded  the  Tepanec  territory, 
besieging  and  capturing  its  capital,  Azcapuzalco.1  The  conqueror  lost  by 
his  clemency  what  he  had  gained  by  arms,  and  it  was  not  long  before  he 
was  in  turn  shut  up  in  his  own  capital.  He  did  not  succeed  in  defending  it, 
and  was  at  last  killed.  So  Tezozomoc  reached  his  vantage  of  ambition,  and 
was  now  in  his  old  age  the  lord  paramount  of  the  country.  He  tried  to 
harmonize  the  varied  elements  of  his  people  ; but  the  Mexicans  had  not 
fared  in  the  general  successes  as  they  had  hoped  for,  and  were  only  openly 
content.  The  death  of  Tezozomoc  prepared  the  way  for  one  of  his  sons, 
Maxtla,  to  seize  the  command,  and  the  vassal  lords  soon  found  that  the 
spirit  which  had  murdered  a brother  had  aims  that  threatened  wider  deso- 
lation. The  Mexicans  were  the  particular  object  of  Maxtla’s  oppressive 
spirit,  and  by  the  choice  of  Itzcoatl  for  their  ruler,  who  had  been  for  many 
years  the  Mexican  war-chief,  that  people  defied  the  lord  of  all,  and  in  this 
they  were  joined  by  the  Tlatelulcas  under  Quauhtlatohuatzin,  and  by  lesser 
allies.  Under  this  combination  of  his  enemies  Maxtla’s  capital  fell,  the 
usurper  was  sacrificed,  and  the  honors  of  the  victory  were  shared  by  Itz- 
coatl, Nezahualcoyotl  (the  Acolhuan  prince  whose  imperial  rights  Maxtla 
had  usurped),  and  Montezuma,  the  first  of  the  name,  — all  who  had  in  their 
several  capacities  led  the  army  of  three  or  four  hundred  thousand  allies, 

1 On  the  conquest  of  the  Tecpanecas  by  the  Mexicans,  see  the  references  in  Bandelier  ( Pea- 
body Mus.  Reports,  ii.  412). 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


147 


if  we  may  believe  the  figures,  to  their  successes,  which  occurred  apparently 
somewhere  between  1425  and  1430.  The  political  result  was  a tripartite 
confederacy  in  Anahuac,  consisting  of  Acolhua,  Mexico,  and  Tlacopan.  In 
the  division  of  spoils,  the  latter  was  to  have  one  fifth,  and  the  others  two 
fifths  each,  the  Acolhuan  prince  presiding  in  their  councils  as  senior.1 

The  next  hundred  years  is  a record  of  the  increasing  power  of  this  con- 
federacy, with  a constant  tendency  to  give  Mexico  a larger  influence.2  The 
two  capitals,  Tenochtitlan  and  Tezcuco,  looking  at  each  other  across  the 
lake,  were  uninterruptedly  growing  in  splendor,  or  in  what  the  historians  call 
by  that  word,3  with  all  the  adjuncts  of  public  works, — causeways,  canals, 
aqueducts,  temples,  palaces  and  gardens,  and  other  evidences  of  wealth, 
which  perhaps  these  modern  terms  only  approximately  represent.  Tezcuco 
was  taken  possession  of  by  Nezahualcoyotl  as  his  ancient  inheritance,  and 
his  confederate  Itzcoatl  placed  the  crown  on  his  head.  Together  they  made 
war  north  and  south.  Xochimilco,  on  the  lake  next  south  of  Mexico, 
yielded ; and  the  people  of  Chaleo,  which  was  on  the  most  southern  of  the 
string  of  lakes,  revolted  and  were  suppressed  more  than  once,  as  opportuni- 
ties offered.  The  confederates  crossed  the  ridge  that  formed  the  southern 
bound  of  the  Mexican  valley  and  sacked  Quauhnahuac.  The  Mexican  ruler 
had  in  all  this  gained  a certain  ascendency  in  the  valley  coalition,  when  he 
died  in  1440,  and  his  nephew,  Montezuma  the  soldier,  and  first  of  the  name,1 * 
succeeded  him.  This  prince  soon  had  on  his  hands  another  war  with  Chaleo, 
and  with  the  aid  of  his  confederates  he  finally  humbled  its  presumptuous 
people.  So,  with  or  without  pretence,  the  wars  and  conquests  went  on,  if 
for  no  other  reasons,  to  obtain  prisoners  for  sacrifice.6  They  were  diversi- 
fied at  times,  particularly  in  1449,  by  contests  with  the  powers  of  nature, 
when  the  rising  waters  of  the  lake  threatened  to  drown  their  cities,  and 
when,  one  evil  being  cured,  others  in  the  shape  of  famine  and  plague  suc- 
ceeded. 


1 For  details  of  the  period  of  the  Chichimec 
ascendency,  see  Bancroft  (v.  ch.  5-7),  Brasseur 
(Nat.  Civil,  ii.),  and  the  authorities  plentifully 
cited  in  Bancroft. 

2 On  the  nature  of  the  Mexican  confederacy 
see  Bandelier  ( Peabody  Mus.  Reports , ii.  416). 

He  enumerates  the  authorities  upon  the  point 

that  no  one  of  the  allied  tribes  exercised  any 
powers  over  the  others  beyond  the  exclusive 
military  direction  of  the  Mexicans  proper  ( Pea- 
body Mus.  Reports,  ii.  559).  Orozco  y Berra 

( Geografia,  etc.)  claims  that  there  was  a tendency 
to  assimilate  the  conquered  people  to  the  Mexi- 
can conditions.  Bandelier  claims  that  “ no  at- 
tempt, either  direct  or  implied,  was  made  to 
assimilate  or  incorporate  them.”  He  urges  that 
nowhere  on  the  march  to  Mexico  did  Cortes  fall 
in  with  Mexican  rulers  of  subjected  tribes.  It 

does  not  seem  to  be  clear  in  all  cases  whether  it 
was  before  or  after  the  confederation  was  formed, 
or  whether  it  was  by  the  Mexicans  or  Tezcucans 


that  Tecpaneca,  Xochimilca,  Cuitlahuac, Chaleo, 
Acolhuacan,  and  Quauhnahuac,  were  conquered. 
Cf.  Bandelier  in  Peabody  Mus.  Reports,  ii.  691. 
As  to  the  tributaries,  see  Ibid.  695. 

8 Cf.  Brasseur’s  Nations  Civ.  ii.  457,  on  Tez- 
cuco in  its  palmy  days. 

4 Sometimes  written  Mochtheuzema,  Mokte- 
zema.  The  Aztec  Montezuma  must  not,  as  is 
contended,  be  confounded  with  the  hero-god  of 
the  New  Mexicans.  Cf.  Bancroft,  iii.  77,  17 1 ; 
Brinton’s  Myths , 190 ; Schoolcraft’s  Ind.  Tribes, 
iv.  73  ; Tylor’s  Prim.  Culture,  ii.  384;  Short,  333. 

6 This  has  induced  some  historians  to  call 
these  wars  “ holy  wars.”  Bandelier  discredits 
wholly  the  common  view,  that  wars  were  under- 
taken to  secure  victims  for  the  sacrificial  stone 
( Archceol . Tour,  24).  Butin  another  place  ( Pea- 
body Mus.  Reports,  ii.  128)  he  says:  “War  was 
required  for  the  purpose  of  obtaining  human  vic- 
tims, their  religion  demanding  human  sacrifices 
at  least  eighteen  times  every  year.” 


148  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Sometimes  in  the  wars  the  confederates  over-calculated  their  own  prowess, 
as  when  Atonaltzin  of  Tilantongo  sent  them  reeling  back,  only,  however,  to 
make  better  preparations  and  to  succeed  at  last.  In  another  war  to  the 
southeast  they  captured,  as  the  accounts  say,  over  six  thousand  victims  for 
the  stone  of  sacrifice. 

The  first  Montezuma  died  in  1469,  and  the  choice  for  succession  fell  on 
his  grandson,  the  commander  of  the  Mexican  army,  Axayacatl,  who  at  once 
followed  the  usual  custom  of  raiding  the  country  to  the  south  to  get  the 
thousands  of  prisoners  whose  sacrifice  should  grace  his  coronation.  Neza- 
hualcoyotl,  the  other  principal  allied  chieftain,  survived  his  associate  but 
two  years,  dying  in  1472,  leaving  among  his  hundred  children  but  one  legit- 
imate son,  Nezahualpilli,  a minor,  who  succeeded.  This  gave  the  new  Mex- 
ican ruler  the  opportunity  to  increase  his  power.  He  made  Tlatelulco 
tributary,  and  a Mexican  governor  took  the  place  there  of  an  independent 
sovereign.  He  annexed  the  Matlaltzinca  provinces  on  the  west.  So  Axa- 
yacatl, dying  in  1481,  bequeathed  an  enlarged  kingdom  to  his  brother  and 
successor,  Tizoc,  who  has  not  left  so  warlike  a record.  According  to  some 
authorities,  however,  he  is  to  be  credited  with  the  completion  of  the  great 
Mexican  temple  of  Huitzilopochtli.  This  did  not  save  him  from  assassina- 
tion, and  his  brother  Ahuitzotl  in  i486  succeeded,  and  to  him  fell  the  lot 
of  dedicating  that  great  temple.  He  conducted  fresh  wars  vigorously 
enough  to  be  able  within  a year,  if  we  may  believe  the  native  records,  to 
secure  sixty  or  seventy  thousand  captives  for  the  sacrificial  stone,  so  essen- 
tial a part  of  all  such  dedicatory  exercises.  It  would  be  tedious  to  enumer- 
ate all  the  succeeding  conquests,  though  varied  by  some  defeats,  like  that 
which  they  experienced  in  the  Tehuantepec  region.  Some  differences  grew 
up,  too,  between  the  Mexican  chieftain  and  Nezahualpilli,  notwithstanding 
or  because  of  the  virtues  of  the  latter,  among  which  doubtless,  according  to 
the  prevailing  standard,  we  must  count  his  taking  at  once  three  Mexican 
princesses  for  wives,  and  his  keeping  a harem  of  over  two  thousand  women, 
if  we  may  believe  his  descendant,  the  historian  Ixtlilxochitl.  His  justice 
as  an  arbitrary  monarch  is  mentioned  as  exemplary,  and  his  putting  to  death 
a guilty  son  is  recounted  as  proof  of  it. 

Ahuitzotl  had  not  as  many  virtues,  or  perhaps  he  had  not  a descendant  to 
record  them  so  effectively;  but  when  he  died  in  1503,  what  there  was  he- 
roic in  his  nature  was  commemorated  in  his  likeness  sculptured  with  others 
of  his  line  on  the  cliff  of  Chapultepec.1  To  him  succeeded  that  Monte- 
zuma, son  of  Axayacatl,  with  whom  later  this  ancient  history  vanishes. 
When  he  came  to  power,  the  Aztec  name  was  never  significant  of  more 
lordly  power,  though  the  confederates  had  already  had  some  reminders  that 
conquest  near  home  was  easier  than  conquest  far  away.  The  policy  of  the 

1 As  to  these  carvings,  which  have  not  yet  sa’s  Hist.de  Mexico  (Mexico,  1862).  See  pictures 
wholly  disappeared,  see  Peabody  Mus.  Reports,  of  Montezuma  II.  in  Vol.  II.  361,  363,  and  that 
ii.  677,  678.  There  is  a series  of  alleged  por-  in  Ranking,  p.  313. 
traits  of  the  Mexican  kings  in  Carbajal-Espino- 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


149 


last  Aztec  ruler  was  far  from  popular,  and  while  he  propitiated  the  higher 
ranks,  he  estranged  the  people.  The  hopes  of  the  disaffected  within  and 
without  Anahuac  were  now  centred  in  the  Tlascalans,  whose  territory  lay 
easterly  towards  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  who  had  thus  far  not  felt  the  bur- 
den of  Aztec  oppression.  Notwithstanding  that  their  natural  allies,  the  Cho- 
lulans,  turned  against  the  Tlascalans,  the  Aztec  armies  never  succeeded  in 
humbling  them,  as  they  did  the  Mistecs  and  the  occupants  of  the  region 
towards  the  Pacific.  Eclipses,  earthquakes,  and  famine  soon  succeeded  one 
another,  and  the  forebodings  grew  numerous.  Hardly  anything  happened 
but  the  omens  of  disaster 1 were  seen  in  it,  and  superstition  began  to  do  its 
work  of  enervation,  while  a breach  between  Montezuma  and  the  Tezcucan 
chief  was  a bad  augury.  In  this  condition  of  things  the  Mexican  king  tried 
to  buoy  his  hopes  by  further  conquests  ; but  widespread  as  these  invasions 
were,  Michoacan  to  the  west,  and  Tlascala  to  the  east,  always  kept  their 
independence.  The  Zapotecs  in  Oajaca  had  at  one  time  succumbed,  but 
this  was  before  the  days  of  the  last  Montezuma. 

His  rival  across  the  lake  at  Tezcuco  was  more  oppressed  with  the  tales  of 
the  soothsayers  than  Montezuma  was,  and  seems  to  have  become  inert  be- 
fore what  he  thought  an  impending  doom  some  time  before  he  died,  or,  as 
his  people  believed,  before  he  had  been  translated  to  the  ancient  Amaque- 
mecan,  the  cradle  of  his  race.  This  was  in  1515.  His  son  Cacama  was 
chosen  to  succeed  ; but  a younger  brother,  Ixtlilxochitl,  believed  that  the 
choice  was  instigated  by  Montezuma*for  ulterior  gain,  and  so  began  a revolt 
in  the  outlying  provinces,  in  which  he  received  the  aid  of  Tlascala.  The 
appearance  of  the  Spaniards  on  the  coasts  of  Yucatan  and  Tabasco,  of  which 
exaggerated  reports  reached  the  Mexican  capital,  paralyzed  Montezuma,  so 
that  the  northern  revolt  succeeded,  and  Cacama  and  Ixtlilxochitl  came  to  an 
understanding,  which  left  the  Mexicans  without  much  exterior  support. 
Montezuma  was  in  this  crippled  condition  when  his  lookouts  on  the  coast 
sent  him  word  that  the  dreaded  Spaniards  had  appeared,  and  he  could  rec- 
ognize their  wonderful  power  in  the  pictured  records  which  the  messenger 
bore  to  him.2  This  portent  was  the  visit  in  1518  of  Juan  de  Grijalva  to  the 
spot  where  Vera  Cruz  now  stands  ; and  after  the  Spaniard  sailed  away,  there 
were  months  of  anxiety  before  word  again  reached  the  capital,  in  1519,  of 
another  arrival  of  the  white-winged  vessels,  and  this  was  the  coming  of  Cor- 
tes, who  was  not  long  in  discovering  that  the  path  of  his  conquest  was  made 
clear  by  the  current  belief  that  he  was  the  returned  Quetzalcoatl,3  and  by 


1 Bancroft  (v.  466)  enumerates  the  great  va- 
riety of  such  proofs  of  disaster,  and  gives  refer- 
ences (p.  469).  Cf.  Prescott,  i.  p.  309. 

2 Tezozomoc  (cap.  106)  gives  the  description 
of  the  first  bringing  of  the  news  to  Montezuma 
of  the  arrival  of  the  Spaniards  on  the  coast. 

3 Brinton’s  Amer.  Hero  Myths , 139,  etc.  See, 

on  the  prevalence  of  the  idea  of  the  return  at 
some  time  of  the  hero-god,  Brinton’s  Myths  of 
the  New  World,  p.  160.  “ We  must  remember,” 


he  says,  “ that  a fiction  built  on  an  idea  is  infi- 
nitely more  tenacious  of  life  than  a story  founded 
on  fact.”  Brinton  [Myths,  188)  gathers  from 
Gomara,  Cogolludo,  Villagutierre,  and  others, 
instances  to  show  how  prevalent  in  America  was 
the  presentiment  of  the  arrival  and  domination 
of  a white  race,  — a belief  still  prevailing  among 
their  descendants  of  the  middle  regions  of  Amer- 
ica who  watch  for  the  coming  of  Montezuma 
[Ibid.  p.  190).  Brinton  does  not  seem  to  recog- 


150  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 

his  quick  perception  of  the  opportunity  which  presented  itself  of  combining 
and  leading  the  enemies  of  Montezuma.1 


Among  what  are  usually  reckoned  the  civilized  nations  of  middle  Amer- 
ica, there  are  two  considerable  centres  of  a dim  history  that  have  little 
relation  with  the  story  which  has  been  thus  far  followed.  One  of  these  is 
that  of  the  people  of  what  we  now  call  Guatemala,  and  the  other  that  of 
Yucatan.  Tne  political  society  which  existed  in  Guatemala  had  nothing  of 
the  known  duration  assigned  to  the  more  northern  people,  at  least  not  in 
essential  data;  but  we  know  of  it  simply  as  a very  meagre  and  perplexing 
chronology  running  for  the  most  part  back  two  or  three  centuries  only. 
Whether  the  beginnings  of  what  we  suppose  we  know  of  these  people  have 
anything  to  do  with  any  Toltec  migration  southward  is  what  archaeologists 
dispute  about,  and  the  philologists  seem  to  have  the  best  of  the  argument 
in  the  proof  that  the  tongue  of  these  southern  peoples  is  more  like  Maya 
than  Nahua.  It  is  claimed  that  the  architectural  remains  of  Guatemala  in- 
dicate a departure  from  the  Maya  stock  and  some  alliance  with  a foreign 
stock ; and  that  this  alien  influence  was  Nahuan  seems  probable  enough 
when  we  consider  certain  similarities  in  myth  and  tradition  of  the  Nahuas 
and  the  Quiches.  But  we  have  not  much  even  of  tradition  and  myth  of 
the  early  days,  except  what  we  may  read  in  the  Popul  Vuh,  where  we  may 
make  out  of  it  what  we  can,  or  even  what  we  please,2  with  some  mysterious 
connection  with  Votan  and  Xibalba*  Among  the  mythical  traditions  of 
this  mythical  period,  there  are  the  inevitable  migration  stories,  beginning 
with  the  Quiches  and  ending  with  the  coming  of  the  Cakchiquels,  but  no 
one  knows  to  a surety  when.  The  new-comers  found  Maya-speaking  peo- 
ple, and  called  them  mem  or  memes  (stutterers),  because  they  spoke  the 
Maya  so  differently  from  themselves. 

It  was  in  the  twelfth  or  thirteenth  century  that  we  get  the  first  traces  of 
any  historical  kind  of  the  Quiches  and  of  their  rivals  the  Cakchiquels.  Of 
their  earlv  rulers  we  have  the  customary  diversities  and  inconsistencies 
in  what  purports  to  be  their  story,  dnd  it  is  difficult  to  say  whethei  this  or 
the  other  or  some  other  tribe  revolted,  conquered,  or  were  beaten,  as  we  read 
the  annals  of  this  constant  warfare.  We  meet  something  tangible,  how- 
ever, when  we  learn  that  Montezuma  sent  a messenger,  who  informed  the 


nize  the  view  held  by  many  that  the  Montezuma 
of  the  Aztecs  was  quite  a different  being  from 
the  demigod  of  the  Pueblas  of  New  Mexico. 

1 It  is  not  easy  to  reconcile  the  conflicting 
statements  of  the  native  historians  respecting 
the  course  of  events  during  the  Aztec  suprem- 
acv,  such  is  the  mutual  jealousy  of  the  Mexican 
and  Tezcucan  writers.  Brasseur  has  satisfied 
himself  of  the  authenticity  of  a certain  sequence 
and  character  of  events  ( Nations  Civilisees),  and 
Bancroft  simply  follows  him  (v.  401).  Veytia  is 
occupied  more  with  the  Tezcucans  than  with  the 
Aztecs.  The  condensed  sketch  here  given  fol- 


lows the  main  lines  of  the  collated  records.  We 
find  good  pictures  of  the  later  history  of  Mex- 
ico and  Tlascala,  before  the  Spaniards  came, 
in  Prescott  (i.  book  2d,  ch.  vi.,  and  book  3d,  ch. 
ii.).  Bancroft  (v.  ch.  10)  with  his  narrative  and 
references  helps  us  out  with  the  somewhat  mo- 
notonous details  of  all  the  districts  of  Mexico 
which  were  outside  the  dominance  of  the  Mexi- 
can valley,  as  of  Cholula,  Tlascala,  Michoacan, 
and  Oajaca,  with  the  Miztecs  and  Zapotecs,  in- 
habiting this  last  province. 

2 Bancroft  (v.  543-553)- 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


IS  I 


Quiches  of  the  presence  of  the  Spaniards  in  his  capital,  which  set  them 
astir  to  be  prepared  in  their  turn. 


MAP  IN  BRASSEUR’S  POPUL  VUH. 


It  is  in  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century  that  we  encounter  the 
rivalries  of  three  prominent  peoples  in  this  Guatemala  country,  and  these 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


152 


were  the  Quiches,  the  Cakchiquels,  and  the  Zutigils  ; and  of  these  the  Qui- 
ches, with  their  main  seat  at  Utatlan,  were  the  most  powerful,  though  not 
so  much  so  but  the  Cakchiquels  could  get  the  best  of  them  at  times  in  the 
wager  of  war  ; as  they  did  also  finally  when  the  Spaniard  Alvarado  ap- 
peared, with  whom  the  Cakchiquels  entered  into  an  alliance  that  brought 
the  Quiches  into  sore  straits. 


A more  important  nationality  attracts  us  in  the  Mayas  of  Yucatan.  There 
can  be  nothing  but  vague  surmise  as  to  what  were  the  primitive  inhabitants 
of  this  region  ; but  it  seems  to  be  tolerably  clear  that  a certain  homogene- 
ousness pervaded  the  people,  speaking  one  tongue,  which  the  Spaniards 
found  in  possession.  Whether  these  had  come  from  the  northern  regions, 
and  were  migrated  Toltecs,  as  some  believe,  is  open  to  discussion.1  It  has 
often  been  contended  that  they  were  originally  of  the  Nahua  and  Toltec 
blood ; but  later  writers,  like  Bancroft,2  have  denied  it.  Brinton  discards 
the  Toltec  element  entirely. 

What  by  a license  one  may  call  history  begins  back  with  the  semi-mythi- 
cal Zamna,  to  whom  all  good  things  are  ascribed  — the  introduction  of  the 
Maya  institutions  and  of  the  Maya  hieroglyphics.3  Whether  Zamna  had 
any  connection,  shadowy  or  real,  with  the  great  Votanic  demigod,  and  with 
the  establishment  of  the  Xibalban  empire,  if  it  may  be  so  called,  is  a thing 
to  be  asserted  or  denied,  as  one  inclines  to  separate  or  unite  the  traditions 
of  Yucatan  with  those  of  the  Tzendal,  Quiche,  and  Toltec.  Ramon  de  Or- 
donez, in  a spirit  of  vagary,  tells  us  that  Mayapan,  the  great  city  of  the 
early  Mayas,  was  but  one  of  the  group  of  centres,  with  Palenque,  Tulan, 
and  Copan  for  the  rest,  as  is  believed,  which  made  up  the  Votanic  empire. 
Perhaps  it  was.  If  we  accept  Brinton’s  view,  it  certainly  was  not.  Then 
Torquemada  and  Landa  tell  us  that  Cukulcan,  a great  captain  and  a god, 
was  but  another  Quetzalcoatl,  or  Gucumatz.  Perhaps  he  was.  Possibly 
also  he  was  the  bringer  of  Nahua  influence  to  Mayapan,  away  back  in  a 
period  corresponding  to  the  early  centuries  of  the  Christian  era.  It  is  easy 
to  say,  in  all  this  confusion,  this  is  proved  and  that  is  not.  The  historian, 
accustomed  to  deal  with  palpable  evidence,  feels  much  inclined  to  leave  all 
views  in  abeyance. 

The  Cocomes  of  Yucatan  history  were  Cukulcan’s  descendants  or  follow- 
ers, and  had  a prosperous  history,  as  we  are  told;  and  there  came  to  live 
among  them  the  Totul  Xius,  by  some  considered  a Maya  people,  who  like 


1 It  is  so  held  by  Stephens,  Waldeck,  Mayer, 
Prichard,  Ternaux-Compans,  not  to  name  others. 

2 Vol.  v.  617. 

3 The  Maya  calendar  and  astronomical  sys- 
tem, as  the  basis  of  the  Maya  chronology,  is  ex- 
plained in  the  version  which  Perez  gave  into 
Spanish  of  a Maya  manuscript  (translated  into 
English  by  Stephens  in  his  Yucatan ),  and  which 
Valentini  has  used  in  his  “ Katunes  of  Maya 
History,”  in  the  Amer.  Antiq.  Sac.  Proc.,  Oct. 


1879.  On  the  difficulties  of  the  subject  see  Bras- 
seur’s  Nations  Civilisees  (ii.  ch.  1 ).  Cf.  also  his 
Landa,  section  xxxix.,  and  page  366,  from  the 
“Cronologia  antigua  de  Yucatan.”  Cf.  further, 
Cyrus  Thomas’s  MS.  Troano,  ch.  2,  and  Powell’s 
Third  Report  Bur.  of  Ethn.,  pp.  xxx  and  3 ; 
Ancona’s  Yucatan , ch.  xi. ; Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races , 
ii.  ch.  24,  with  references;  Short,  ch.  9;  Brin- 
ton’s Maya  Chronicles,  introduction,  p.  50. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


153 


the  Quiches  had  been  subjected  to  Nahua  influences,  and  who  implanted 
in  the  monuments  and  institutions  of  Yucatan  those  traces  of  Nahua  char- 
acter which  the  archaeologists  discover.1  The  Totul  Xius  are  placed  in 
Uxmal  in  the  tenth,  eleventh,  and  twelfth  centuries,  where  they  flourished 
along  with  the  Cocomes,  and  it  is  to  them  that  it  is  claimed  many  of  the 
ruins  which  now  interest  us  in  Yucatan  can  be  traced,  though  some  of  them 
perhaps  go  back  to  Zamna  and  to  the  Xibalban  period,  or  at  least  it  would 
be  hard  to  prove  otherwise. 

When  at  last  the  Cocome  chieftains  began  to  oppress  their  subjects,  the 
Totul  Xius  gave  them  shelter,  and  finally  assisted  them  in  a revolt,  which 
succeeded  and  made  Uxmal  the  supreme  city,  and  Mayapan  became  a ruin, 
or  at  least  was  much  neglected.  The  dynasty  of  the  Totul  Xius  then  flour- 
ished, but  was  in  its  turn  overthrown,  and  a period  of  factions  and  revolu- 
tions followed,  during  which  Mayapan  was  wholly  obliterated,  and  the  Totul 
Xius  settled  in  Mani,  where  the  Spaniards  found  them  when  they  invaded 
Yucatan  to  make  an  easy  conquest  of  a divided  people.2 


CRITICAL  ESSAY  ON  THE  SOURCES  OF  INFORMATION. 


FROM  the  conquerors  of  New  Spain  we  fail  to  get  any  systematic  portrayal  of  the  char- 
acter and  history  of  the  subjugated  people  ; but  nevertheless  we  are  not  without  some 
help  in  such  studies  from  the  letters  of  Cortes,3  the  accounts  of  the  so-called  anonymous 
conqueror,4  and  from  what  Stephens 5 calls  “the  hurried  and  imperfect  observations  of 
an  unlettered  soldier,”  Bernal  Diaz.6 

We  cannot  neglect  for  this  ancient  period  the  more  general  writers  on  New  Spain, 
some  of  whom  lived  near  enough  to  the  Conquest  to  reflect  current  opinions  upon  the  abo- 
riginal life  as  it  existed  in  the  years  next  succeeding  the  fall  of  Mexico.  Such  are  Peter 
Martyr,  Grynaeus,  Munster,  and  Ramusio.  More  in  the  nature  of  chronicles  is  the  Histo- 
ria  General  of  Oviedo  (1535,  etc.).7  The  Historia  General  of  Gomara  became  generally 
known  soon  after  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century.8  The  Rapport , written  about  1560, 
by  Alonzo  de  Zurita,  throws  light  on  the  Aztec  laws  and  institutions.9  Benzoni  about  this 


1 Bancroft  (v.  624)  epitomizes  the  Perez  man- 
uscript given  by  Stephens,  the  sole  source  of  this 
Totul  Xiu  legendary. 

2 Brasseur’s  Nations  Civil isees  ( i .,  ii. ),with  the 
Perez  manuscript,  and  Landa’s  Relacion,  are  the 
sufficient  source  of  the  Yucatan  history.  Ban- 
croft’s last  chapter  of  his  fifth  volume  summa- 
rizes it. 

3 See  Vol.  II.  p.  402. 

4 See  Vol.  II.  p.  397. 

5 Central  America,  ii.  452. 

6 See  Vol.  II.  p.  414. 

7 See  Vol.  II.  p.  343. 

8 See  Vol.  II.  p.  412. 

9 See  Vol.  II.  p.  417.  Cf.  Prescott’s  Mexico, 
i.  50;  Bancroft  {Nat.  Races,  ii.  ch.  14)  epito- 
mizes the  information  on  the  laws  and  courts  of 


the  Nahua;  Bandelier  ( Peabody  Mus.  Repts.,  ii. 
446),  referring  to  Zurita’s  Report,  which  he  char- 
acterizes as  marked  for  perspicacity,  deep  knowl- 
edge, and  honest  judgment,  speaks  of  it  as  em- 
bodying the  experience  of  nearly  twenty  years, — 
eleven  of  which  were  passed  in  Mexico,  — and 
in  which  the  author  gave  answers  to  inquiries 
put  by  the  king.  “ If  we  could  obtain,”  says 
Bandelier,  “ all  the  answers  given  to  these  ques- 
tions from  all  parts  of  Spanish  America,  and  all 
as  elaborate  and  truthful  as  those  of  Zurita,  Pa- 
lacio,  and  Ondegardo,  our  knowledge  of  the  ab- 
original history  and  ethnology  of  Spanish  Amer- 
ica would  be  much  advanced.”  Zurita’s  Report 
in  a French  translation  is  in  Ternaux-Compans’ 
Collection;  the  original  is  in  Pacheco’s  Docs, 
inlditos,  but  in  a mutilated  text. 


» 


154 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


time  traversed  the  country,  observing  the  Indian  customs.1  We  find  other  descriptions 
of  the  aboriginal  customs  by  the  missionary  Didacus  Valades,  in  his  Rhetorica  Chris- 
tiana, of  which  the  fourth  part  relates  to  Mexico.2  Brasseur  says  that  Valades  was  well 


MS.  OF  BERNAL  DIAZ* 

1 See  Vol.  II.  p.  346.  briars  who  on  May  13,  1524,  landed  in  Mexico  to 

2 It  is  much  we  owe  to  the  twelve  Franciscan  convert  and  defend  the  natives.  It  is  from  their 

* Fac-simile  of  the  beginning  of  Capitulo  LXXIV.  of  his  Historia  Vcrdadera , following  a plate  in  the  fourth 
volume  of  J.  M.  de  Heredia’s  French  translation  (Paris,  1877). 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


155 


informed  and  appreciative  of  the  people  which  he  so  kindly  depicted.1  By  the  beginning 
of  the  seventeenth  century  we  find  in  Herrera’s  Historia  the  most  comprehensive  of  the 
historical  surveys,  in  which  he  summarizes  the  earlier  writers,  if  not  always  exactly.2 
Bandelier  (. Peabody  Mus.  Repts.,  ii.  387)  says  of  the  ancient  history  of  Mexico  that  “it 
appears  as  if  the  twelfth  century  was  the  limit  of  definite  tradition.  What  lies  beyond  it 
is  vague  and  uncertain,  remnants  of  tradition  being  intermingled  with  legends  and  mytho- 
logical fancies.”  He  cites  some  of  the  leading  writers  as  mainly  starting  in  their  stories 
respectively  as  follows  : Brasseur,  b.  c.  955  ; Clavigero,  a.  d.  596  ; Veytia,  a.  d.  697 ; Ixt- 
lilxochitl,  A.  D.  503.  Bandelier  views  all  these  dates  as  too  mythical  for  historical  inves- 
tigations, and  finds  no  earlier  fixed  date  than  the  founding  of  Tenochtitlan  (Mexico)  in 
A.  D.  1325.  “ What  lies  beyond  the  twelfth  century  can  occasionally  be  rendered  of  value 

for  ethnological  purposes,  but  it  admits  of  no  definite  historical  use.”  Bancroft  (v.  360) 
speaks  of  the  sources  of  disagreement  in  the  final  century  of  the  native  annals,  from  the 
constant  tendency  of  such  writers  as  Ixtlilxochitl,  Tezozomoc,  Chimalpain,  and  Camargo, 
to  laud  their  own  people  and  defame  their  rivals. 


In  the  latter  part  of  the  sixteenth  century  the  viceroy  of  Mexico,  Don  Martin  Enriquez, 
set  on  foot  some  measures  to  gather  the  relics  and  traditions  of  the  native  Mexicans. 
Under  this  incentive  it  fell  to  Juan  de  Tobar,  a Jesuit,  and  to  Diego  Duran,  a Dominican, 
to  be  early  associated  with  the  resuscitation  of  the  ancient  history  of  the  country. 

To  Father  Tobar  (or  Tovar)  we  owe  what  is  known  as  the  Codex  Ramirez,  which  in  the 
edition  of  the  Cronica  MexicaiiazYoy  Hernando  de  Alvarado  Tezozomoc,  issued  in  Mex- 
ico (1878),  with  annotations  by  Orozco  y Berra,  is  called  a Relacion  del origen  de  los  ludios 
que  habitan  esto.  nueva  Espana  segun  sus  historias  (Josd  M.  Vigil,  editor).  It  is  an  im- 
portant source  of  our  knowledge  of  the  ancient  history  of  Mexico,  as  authoritatively  inter- 
preted by  the  Aztec  priests,  from  their  picture-writings,  at  the  bidding  of  Ramirez  de  Fu- 
enleal,  Bishop  of  Cuenca.  This  ecclesiastic  carried  the  document  with  him  to  Spain,  where 
in  Madrid  it  is  still  preserved.  It  was  used  by  Herrera.  Chavero  and  Brinton  recognize 
its  representative  value.4 

To  Father  Duran  we  are  indebted  for  an  equally  ardent  advocacy  of  the  rights  of  the 
natives  in  his  Historia  de  las  Indias  de  Nueva-Espaha  y islas  de  Tierra-F irmc  (1579- 
81),  which  was  edited  in  part  (1867),  as  stated  elsewhere  5 by  Josd  F.  Ramirez,  and  after 
an  interval  completed  (1880)  by  Prof.  Gumesindo  Mendoza,  of  the  Museo  Nacional, — 
the  perfected  work  making  two  volumes  of  text  and  an  atlas  of  plates.  Both  from  Tobar 
and  from  Duran  some  of  the  contemporary  writers  gathered  largely  their  material.6 


writings  that  we  must  draw  a large  part  of  our 
knowledge  respecting  the  Indian  character,  con- 
dition, and  history.  These  Christian  apostles 
were  Martin  de  Valencia,  Francisco  de  Soto, 
Martin  de  Coruna,  Juan  Xuares,  Antonio  de 
Ciudad  Rodrigo,  Toribio  de  Benavente,  Garcia 
de  Cisneros,  Luis  de  Fuensalida,  Juan  de  Ribas, 
Francisco  Ximenez,  Andres  de  Cordoba,  Juan 
de  Palos. 

From  the  Historia  of  Las  Casas,  particularly 
from  that  part  of  it  called  Apologltica  historia, 
we  can  also  derive  some  help.  (Cf.  Vol.  II.  p. 
34°- ) 

1 Brasseur,  Bib.  Mcx.-Guat.,  p.  147;  Leclerc, 

p.  1 68. 

2 Herrera  is  furthermore  the  source  of  much 
that  we  read  in  later  works  concerning  the  native 
religion  and  habits  of  life.  See  Vol.  II.  p.  67. 

3 Cf.  Vol.  II.  p.  418. 

4 Anales  del  Museo  Nacional , iii.  4,  120  ; Brin- 
ton’s  Am.  Hero  Myths,  78.  Bandelier,  in  N.  V. 


Hist.  Soc.  Proc.,  November,  1879,  used  a portion 
of  the  MS.  as  printed  by  Sir  Thomas  Phillipps 
[Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  i.  115)  under  the  title 
of  Historia  de  los  Yndios  Mexicanos,  por  Juan 
dc  Tovar  ; Cura  et  impensis  Dni  Thomce  Phil- 
lipps, Bart,  (privately  printed  at  Middle  Hill, 
1S60.  See  Squier  Catalogue,  no.  1417).  The 
document  is  translated  by  Henry  Phillipps,  Jr., 
in  the  Proc.  Amer.  Philosophical  Soc.  ( Philad. ), 
xxi.  616. 

5 Vol.  II.  p.  419.  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg’s 
Bibl.  Mex.-Guat.,  p.  59.  He  used  a MS.  copy 
in  the  Force  collection. 

6 This  is  true  of  Acosta  and  Davila  Padilla. 
The  bibliography  of  Acosta  has  been  given  else- 
where (Vol.  II.  p.  420).  His  books  v.,  vi.,  and 
vii.  cover  the  ancient  history  of  the  country. 
He  used  the  MSS.  of  Duran  (Brasseur,  Bibl. 
Mex.-Guat.,  p.  2),  and  his  correspondence  with 
Tobar,  preserved  in  the  Lenox  library,  has  been 
edited  by  Icazbalceta  in  his  Don  Fray  Zumdr- 


156  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


We  come  to  a different  kind  of  record  when  we  deal  with  the  Roman  script  of  the  early 
phonetic  rendering  of  the  native  tongues.  It  has  been  pointed  out  that  we  have  perhaps 

the  earliest  of  such  renderings 
in  a single  sentence  in  a publi- 
cation made  at  Antwerp  in  1534, 
where  a Franciscan,  Pedro  de 
Gante,1  under  date  of  June  21, 
1 529>  tells  the  story  of  his  arriv- 
ing in  America  in  1523,  and  his 
spending  the  interval  in  Mex- 
ico and  Tezcuco,  acquiring  a 
knowledge  of  the  natives  and 
enough  of  their  language  to 
close  his  epistle  with  a sentence 
of  it  as  a sample.2  But  no 
chance  effort  of  this  kind  was 
enough.  It  took  systematic 
endeavors  on  the  part  of  the 
priests  to  settle  grammatical 
principles  and  determine  pho- 
netic values,  and  the  measure 
of  their  success  was  seen  in  the 
speedy  way  in  which  the  inter- 
pretation of  the  old  idiograms 
was  forgotten.  Mr.  Brevoort 
has  pointed  out  how  much  the 
progress  of  what  may  be  called 
native  literature,  which  is  to-day 
so  helpful  to  us  in  filling  the 
picture  of  their  ancient  life,  is 
due  to  the  labors  in  this  process 
of  linguistic  transfer  of  Moto- 
linfa,8  Alonzo  de  Molina,4  An- 
drds  de  Olmos,5  and,  above  all, 
s\H\GUN*  ablest  student  of  the 

ancient  tongues  in  his  day,  as 
Mendieta  calls  Father  Sahagun,6  who,  dying  in  1590  at  ninety,  had  spent  a good  part  of 
a long  life  so  that  we  of  this  generation  might  profit  by  his  records.7 


raga  (Mexico,  1881).  Of  the  Provincia  de  San- 
tiago and  the  Varia  Jiistoria  of  Davila  Padilla, 
the  bibliography  has  been  told  in  anothec  place. 
(Cf.  Vol.  II.  pp.  399-400;  Sabin,  v.  18780-1; 
Brasseur  de  Bourbourg’s  Bibl.  Mex.-Guat .,  p.  53  ; 
Pel  Monte  Library , no.  126.)  Ternaux  was  not 
wrong  in  ascribing  great  value  to  the  books. 

1 Peter  of  Ghent.  Cf.  Vol.  II.  p.  417. 

2 Chronica  Compendiosissima  ab  exordio  mundi 
per  Amandum  Zierixcensetn , adjectee  sunt  epis- 
tolez  ex  nova  maris  Oceani  Hispania  ad  nos  trans- 
misses  (Antwerp,  1534).  The  subjoined  letters 
here  mentioned  are,  beside  that  referred  to,  two 
others  written  in  Mexico  (1531),  by  Martin  of 
Valencia  and  Bishop  Zumarraga  (Sabin,  i.  no. 
994 ; Quaritch,  362,  no.  28583,  £7  10).  Icaz- 


balceta  ( Bib.  Mex.  del  Siglo  xvi.,  i.  p.  33)  gives 
a long  account  of  Gante.  There  is  a French 
version  of  the  letter  in  Ternaux’s  Collection. 

3 See  Vol.  II.  p.  397.  Cf.  Prescott,  ii.  95. 
The  first  part  of  the  Historia  is  on  the  religious 
rites  of  the  natives ; the  second  on  their  conver- 
sion to  Christianity ; the  third  on  their  chronol- 
ogy, etc. 

4 Cf.  Icazbalceta’s  Bibl.  Mexicana , p.  220, 
with  references ; Pilling’s  Proof-sheets , no.  2600, 
etc. 

5 Pilling,  no.  2817,  etc. 

6 Properly,  Bernardino  Ribeira;  named  from 
his  birthplace,  Sahagun,  in  Spain.  Chavero’s 
Sakagtin  (Mexico,  1877). 

7 A few  data  can  be  added  to  the  account  of 


* After  a lithograph  in  Cumplido’s  Mexican  edition  of  Prescott’s  Mexico. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


157 


Coming  later  into  the  field  than  Duran,  Acosta,  and  Sahagun,  and  profiting  from  the 
labors  of  his  predecessors,  we  find  in  the  Monarchist  Indiana  of  Torquemada1  the  most 
comprehensive  treatment  of  the  ancient  history  given  to  us  by  any  of  the  early  Spanish 
writers.  The  book,  however,  is  a provoking  one,  from  the  want  of  plan,  its  chrono- 
logical confusion,  and  the  general  lack  of  a critical  spirit2  pervading  it. 

It  is  usually  held  that  the  earliest  amassment  of  native  records  for  historical  purposes, 
after  the  Conquest,  was  that  made  by  Ixtlilxochitl  of  the  archives  of  his  Tezcucan  line, 
which  he  used  in  his  writings  in  a way  that  has  not  satisfied  some  later  investigators. 
Charnay  says  that  in  his  own  studies  he  follows  Veytia  by  preference;  but  Prescott  finds 
beneath  the  high  colors  of  the  pictures  of  Ixtlilxochitl  not  a little  to  be  commended. 
Bandelier,3  on  the  other  hand,  expresses  a distrust  when  he  says  of  Ixtlilxochitl  that  “he 
is  always  a very  suspicious  authority,  not  because  he  is  more  confused  than  any  other  In- 
dian writer,  but  because  he  wrote  for  an  interested  object,  and  with  a view  of  sustaining 
tribal  claims  in  the  eyes  of  the  Spanish  government.”  4 

Among  the  manuscripts  which  seem  to  have  belonged  to  Ixtlilxochitl  was  the  one 
known  in  our  day  under  the  designation  given  to  it  by  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  Codex 


Sahagun  given  in  Vol.  II.  p.  415.  J.  F.  Ramirez 
completes  the  bibliography  of  Sahagun  in  the 
Boletin  de  la  Real  Academia  de  la  Historia  de 
Madrid , vi.  85  (1885).  Icazbalceta,  having  told 
the  story  of  Sahagun’s  life  in  his  edition  of 
Mendieta’s  Hist.  Eclesiastica  Indiana  (Mexico, 
1870),  has  given  an  extended  critical  and  biblio- 
graphical account  in  his  Bibliografia  Mexicana 
(Mexico,  1886),  vol.  i.  247-308.  Other  biblio- 
graphical detail  can  be  gleaned  from  Pilling’s 
Proof-sheets , p.  677,  etc.;  Icazbalceta’s  Apuntes  ; 
Beristain’s  Biblioteca  ; the  Bibliotheca  Mexicana 
of  Ramirez.  The  list  in  Adolfo  Llanos’s  Saha- 
gtin  y sit  historia  de  Mexico  (Museo  Arac.  de  Mix. 
Anales,  iii.,  pt.  3,  p.  71)  is  based  chiefly  on  Al- 
fredo Chavero’s  Sahagtin  (Mexico,  1877).  Bras- 
seur de  Bourbourg,  in  his'  Palenque  (ch.  5),  has 
explained  the  importance  of  what  Brevoort  calls 
Sahagun’s  “great  encyclopaedia  of  the  Mexican 
Empire.”  Rosny  (Les  documents  ecrits  de  P An- 
tiquity Americaine,  p.  69)  speaks  of  seeing  a 
copy  of  the  Historia  in  Madrid,  accompanied  by 
remarkable  Aztec  pictures.  Bancroft,  referring 
to  the  defective  texts  of  Sahagun  in  Kingsbor- 
ough  and  Bustamante,  says  : “ Fortunately  what 
is  missing  in  one  I have  always  found  in  the 
other.”  He  further  speaks  of  the  work  of  Saha- 
gun as  “ the  most  complete  and  comprehensive, 
so  far  as  aboriginal  history  is  concerned,  furnish- 
ing an  immense  mass  of  material,  drawn  from 
native  sources,  very  badly  arranged  and  written.” 
Eleven  books  of  Sahagun  are  given  to  the  social 
institutions  of  the  natives,  and  but  one  to  the 
conquest.  Jourdanet’s  edition  is  mentioned  else- 
where (Vol.  II.). 

1 See  Vol.  II.  p.  421. 

2 Those  who  used  him  most,  like  Clavigero 
and  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  complain  of  this. 
Torquemada,  says  Bandelier  ( Peabody  Mas. 
Repts.  ii.  119),  “notwithstanding  his  unquestion- 
able credulity,  is  extremely  important  on  all  ques- 
tions of  Mexican  antiquities.” 


3 Arner.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s.,  i.  105. 

4 Cf.  Vol.  II.  417;  Prescott,  i.  13,  163,  193,  196; 
Bancroft,  Nat.  Races,  v.  147  ; Wilson’s  Prehis- 
toric Man,  i.  325.  It  must  be  confessed  that 
with  no  more  authority  than  the  old  Mexican 
paintings,  interpreted  through  the  understand- 
ing of  old  men  and  their  traditions,  Ixtlilxochitl 
has  not  the  firmest  ground  to  walk  on.  Aubin 
thinks  that  Ixtlilxochitl’s  confusion  and  contra- 
dictions arise  from  his  want  of  patience  in  study- 
ing his  documents ; and  some  part  of  it  may 
doubtless  have  arisen  from  his  habit,  as  Brasseur 
says  (Annales  de  Philosophic  Chretienne,  May, 
1855,  P-  329)>  °f  altering  his  authorities  to  mag- 
nify the  glories  of  his  genealogic  line.  Max 
Muller  ( Chips  from  a German  Workshop,  i.  322) 
says  of  his  works : “ Though  we  must  not  ex- 
pect to  find  in  them  what  we  are  accustomed  to 
call  history,  they  are  nevertheless  of  great  his- 
torical interest,  as  supplying  the  vague  outlines 
of  a distant  past,  filled  with  migrations,  wars, 
dynasties  and  revolutions,  such  as  were  cherished 
in  the  memory  of  the  Greeks  in  the  time  of  So- 
lon.” In  addition  to  his,  Historia  Chichimeca 
and  his  Relaciones,  (both  of  which  are  given  by 
Kingsborough,  while  Ternaux  has  translated  por- 
tions,) — the  MS.  of  the  Relaciones  being  in  the 
Mexican  archives,  — Ixtlilxochitl  left  a large 
mass  of  his  manuscript  studies  of  the  antiqui- 
ties, often  repetitionary  in  substance.  Some  are 
found  in  the  compilation  made  in  Mexico  by 
Figueroa  in  1792,  by  order  of  the  Spanish  gov- 
ernment (Prescott,  i.  193).  Some  were  in  the 
Ramirez  collection.  Quaritch  (MS.  Collections, 
Jan.,  1888,  no.  136)  held  one  from  that  collection, 
dated  about  1680,  at  ^16,  called  Sumaria  Re- 
lation, which  concerned  the  ancient  Chichimecs. 
Those  which  are  best  known  are  a Historia  de  la 
Nueva  Espaha,  or  Historia  del  Reyno  de  Tezcuco , 
and  a Historia  de  Nuestra  Senora  de  Guadalupe, 
if  this  last  is  by  him. 


158 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Chimalpopoca ,1 2 3 4  in  honor  of  Faustino  Chimalpopoca,  a learned  professor  of  Aztec,  who 
assisted  Brasseur  in  translating  it.  The  anonymous  author  had  set  to  himself  the  task  of 
converting  into  the  written  native  tongue  a rendering  of  the  ancient  hieroglyphics,  con- 
stituting, as  Brasseur  says,  a complete  and  regular  history  of  Mexico  and  Colhuacan.  He 
describes  it  in  his  Lettres  a M.  le  due  de  Valmy  (lettre  seconde) — the  first  part  (in  Mex- 
ican) being  a history  of  the  Chichimecas  ; the  second  (in  Spanish),  by  another  hand,  eluci- 
dating the  antiquities  — as  the  most  rare  and  most  precious  of  all  the  manuscripts 
which  escaped  destruction,  elucidating  what  was  obscure  in  Gomara  and  Torquemada. 

Brasseur  based  upon  this  MS.  his  account  of  the  Toltec  period  in  his  Nations  Ci- 
vilisees  du  Mexique  (i.  p.  lxxviii),  treating  as  an  historical  document  what  in  later  years, 
amid  his  vagaries,  he  assumed  to  be  but  the  record  of  geological  changes.2  A similar  use 
was  made  by  him  of  another  MS.,  sometimes  called  a Memorial  de  Colhuacan,  and  which 
he  named  the  Codex  Gondra  after  the  director  of  the  Museo  Nacional  in  Mexico.3 

Brasseur  says,  in  the  Annales  de  Philosophie  Chretienne,  that  the  Chimalpopoca  MS.  is 
dated  in  1558,  but  in  his  Hist.  Nat.  Civ.,  i.  p.  lxxix,  he  says  that  it  was  written  in  1563 
and  1579,  by  a writer  of  Quauhtitlan,  and  not  by  Ixtlilxochitl,  as  was  thought  by  Pichardo, 
who  with  Gama  possessed  copies  later  owned  by  Aubin.  The  copy  used  by  Brasseur 
was,  as  he  says,  made  from  the  MS.  in  the  Boturini  collection,4  where  it  was  called  His- 
toria  de  los  Reynos  de  Colhuacan  y Mexico ,5 6  and  it  is  supposed  to  be  the  original,  now 
preserved  in  the  Museo  Nacional  de  Mexico.  It  is  not  all  legible,  and  that  institution 
has  published  only  the  better  preserved  and  earlier  parts  of  it,  though  Aubin’s  copies  are 
said  to  contain  the  full  text.  This  edition,  which  is  called  Ana/es  de  Cuauhtitlan,  is 
accompanied  by  two  Spanish  versions,  the  early  one  made  for  Brasseur,  and  a new  one 
executed  by  Mendoza  and  Solis,  and  it  is  begun  in  the  Anales  del  Museo  Nacional  for 
1879  (vol.  ‘-)<6 

The  next  after  Ixtlilxochitl  to  become  conspicuous  as  a collector,  was  Sigiienza  y 
Gongora  (b.  1645),  and  it  was  while  he  was  the  chief  keeper  of  such  records  7 that  the 
Italian  traveller  Giovanni  Francesco  Gemelli  Carreri  examined  them,  and  made  some 
record  of  them.8  A more  important  student  inspected  the  collection,  which  was  later 
gathered  in  the  College  of  San  Pedro  and  San  Pablo,  and  this  was  Clavigero,9  who  mani- 
fested a particular  interest  in  the  picture-writing  of  the  Mexicans,10  and  has  given  us  a 
useful  account  of  the  antecedent  historians.11 


1 Annales  de  Philosophic  Chretienne,  May, 
1855,  p.  326. 

2 In  his  Quatre  Lettres,  p.  24,  he  calls  it  the 
sacred  book  of  the  Toltecs.  “ C’est  le  Livre 
divin  lui-meme,  c’est  le  Teoamoxtli.” 

3 Brasseur’s  Lettres  a M.  le  due  de  Valmy, 
Lettre  seconde. 

4 Catdlogo,  pp.  17,  18. 

6  Brasseur,  Bibl.  Mex.  Guat.,  p.  47  ; Pinart- 
Brasseur  Catal.,  no.  237. 

6 It  has  been  announced  that  Bandelier  is 
engaged  in  a new  translation  of  The  Annals  of 
Quauhtitlan  for  Brinton’s  Aboriginal  Literature 
series.  Cf.  Bancroft,  iii.  57,  63,  and  in  vol.  v., 
where  he  endeavors  to  patch  together  Brasseur’s 
fragments  of  it.  Short,  p.  241. 

7 Humboldt  says  that  Sigiienza  inherited  Ixt- 
lilxochitl’s  collection  ; and  that  it  was  preserved 
in  the  College  of  San  Pedro  till  1759. 

8 Giro  del  tnondo,  1699,  vol.  vi.  Cf.  Kingsbor- 

ough,  vol.  iv.  Robertson  attacked  Carreri’s  char- 

acter for  honesty,  and  claimed  it  was  a received 
opinion  that  he  had  never  been  out  of  Italy. 

Clavigero  defended  Carreri.  Humboldt  thinks 


Carreri’s  local  coloring  shows  he  must  have 
been  in  Mexico. 

9 Cf.  the  bibliog.,  in  Vol.  II.,  p.  425,  of  his 
Storia  A utica  del  Messico. 

10  We  owe  to  him  descriptions  at  this  time  of 
the  collections  of  Mendoza,  of  that  in  the  Va- 
tican, and  of  that  at  Vienna.  Robertson  made 
an  enumeration  of  such  manuscripts ; but  his 
knowledge  was  defective,  and  he  did  not  know 
even  of  those  at  Oxford. 

11  Robertson  was  inclined  to  disparage  Cla- 
vigero’s  work,  asserting  that  he  could  find  little 
in  him  beyond  what  he  took  from  Acosta  and 
Herrera  “ except  the  improbable  narratives  and 
fanciful  conjectures  of  Torquemada  and  Botu- 
rini.” Clavigero  criticised  Robertson,  and  the 
English  historian  in  his  later  editions  replied. 
Prescott  points  out  (i.  70)  that  Clavigero  only 
knew  Sahagun  through  the  medium  of  Torque- 
mada and  later  writers.  Bancroft  (Nat.  Races,  v. 
149;  Mexico,  i.  700)  thinks  that  Clavigero  “owes 
his  reputation  much  more  to  his  systematic  ar- 
rangement and  clear  narration  of  traditions  that 
had  before  been  greatly  confused,  and  to  the 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


159 


The  best  known  efforts  at  collecting  material  for  the  ante-Spanish  history  of  Mexico 
were  made  by  Boturini,1  who  had  come  over  to  New  Spain  in  1736,  on  some  agency  for 
a descendant  of  Montezuma,  the  Countess  de 
Santibanez.  Here  he  became  interested  in  the 
antiquities  of  the  country,  and  spent  eight  years 
roving  about  the  country  picking  up  manuscripts 
and  pictures,  and  seeking  in  vain  for  some  one  to 
explain  their  hieroglyphics.  Some  action  on  his 
part  incurring  the  displeasure  of  the  public  au- 
thorities, he  was  arrested,  his  collection 2 taken 
from  him,  and  he  was  sent  to  Spain.  On  the  voy- 
age an  English  cruiser  captured  the  vessel  in  which 
he  was,  and  he  thus  lost  whatever  he  chanced  to 
have  with  him.3  What  he  left  behind  remained  in 
the  possession  of  the  government,  and  became  the 
spoil  of  damp,  revolutionists,  and  curiosity-seekers. 

Once  again  in  Spain,  Boturini  sought  redress  of  the 
Council  of  the  Indies,  and  was  sustained  by  it  in 
his  petition  ; but  neither  he  nor  his  heirs  succeeded 
in  recovering  his  collection.  He  also  prepared  a 
book  setting  forth  how  he  proposed,  by  the  aid  of  these  old  manuscripts  and  pictures,  to  re- 
suscitate the  forgotten  history  of  the  Mexicans.  The  book  4 is  a jumble  of  notions  ; but 
appended  to  it  was  what  gives  it  its  chief  value,  a “ Catdlogo  del  Museo  histdrico  Indiano,” 
which  tells  us  what  the  collection  was.  While  it  was  thus  denied  to  its  collector,  Mariano 
Veytia,6  who  had  sympathized  with  Boturini  in  Madrid,  had  possession,  for  a while  at 
least,  of  a part  of  it,  and  made  use  of  it  in  his  Historia  Antigua  de  Mejico , but  it  is 
denied,  as  usually  stated,  that  the  authorities  upon  his  death  (1778)  prevented  the  publi- 
cation of  his  book.  The  student  was  deprived  of  Veytia’s  results  till  his  MS.  was  ably 
edited,  with  notes  and  an  appendix,  by  C.  F.  Ortega  (Mexico,  1836).6  Another,  who  was 
connected  at  a later  day  with  the  Boturini  collection,  and  who  was  a more  accurate  writer 
than  Veytia,  was  Antonio  de  Leon  y Gama,  born  in  Mexico  in  1735.  His  Description 
histdricay  Cronologica  de  las  Dos  Piedras  (Mexico,  1832) 7 was  occasioned  by  the  finding, 
in  1790,  of  the  great  Mexican  Calendar  Stone  and  other  sculptures  in  the  Square  of 
Mexico.  This  work  brought  to  bear  Gama’s  great  learning  to  the  interpretation  of  these 
relics,  and  to  an  exposition  of  the  astronomy  and  mythology  of  the  ancient  Mexicans, 
in  a way  that  secured  the  commendation  of  Humboldt.8 


omission  of  the  most  perplexing  and  contradic- 
tory points,  than  to  deep  research  or  new  dis- 
coveries.” 

1 See  Vol.  II.  p.  418.  Brasseur  de  Bour- 
bourg’s  Hist,  des  Nations  Civilisees,  p.  xxxii. 
Clavigero  had  described  it. 

2 He  had  collected  nearly  500  Mexican  paint- 
ings in  all.  Aubin  ( Notices , etc.,  p.  21)  says 
that  Boturini  nearly  exhausted  the  field  in  his 
searches,  and  with  the  collection  of  Sigiienza  he 
secured  all  those  cited  by  Ixtlilxochitl  and  the 
most  of  those  concealed  by  the  Indians,  — of 
which  mention  is  made  by  Torquemada,  Saha- 
gun,  Valades,  Zurita,  and  others ; and  that  the 
researches  of  Bustamante,  Cubas,  Gondra,  and 
others,  up  to  1851,  had  not  been  able  to  add 
muc!»  of  importance  to  what  Boturini  possessed. 


3 This  portion  of  his  collection  has  not  been 
traced.  The  fact  is  indeed  denied. 

4 Idea  de  una  nueva  historia  general  de  la 
America  septejitrional  (Madrid,  1746) ; Carter- 
Brown,  iii.  817  ; Brasseur’s  Bibl.  Mex.-Guat.> 
p.  26;  Field,  Ind.  Bibliog.,  no.  159;  Pinart,  Cata- 
logue, no.  134;  Prescott,  i.  160. 

5 Brasseur,  Bibl.  Mex.-Guat.,  p.  152. 

6 Prescott,  i.  24.  Harrisse,  Bib.  Am.  Vet.,  calls 
Veytia’s  the  best  history  of  the  ancient  period 
yet  (1866)  written. 

7 A second  ed.  (Mexico,  1832)  was  augmented 
with  notes  and  a life  of  the  author,  by  Carlos 
Maria  de  Bustamante  ; Field,  Ind.  Bibiiog.,  no. 
909  ; Brasseur’s  Bibl.  Mex.-Guat.,  p.  68. 

8 Prescott,  i.  133.  Gama  and  others  collected 
another  class  of  hieroglyphics,  of  less  importance. 


* After  a lithograph  in  Cumplido’s  Mexican  edition  of  Prescott’s  Mexico,  vol.  iii. 


i6o 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


During  these  years  of  uncertainty  respecting  the  Boturini  collection,  a certain  hold 
upon  it  seems  to  have  been  shared  successively  by  Pichardo  and  Sanchez,  by  which  in  the 
end  some  part  came  to  the  Museo  Nacional,  in  Mexico.1  It  was  also  the  subject  of  law- 
suits, which  finally  resulted  in  the  dispersion  of  what  was  left  by  public  auction,  at  a time 
when  Humboldt  was  passing  through  Mexico,  and  some  of  its  treasures  were  secured  by 
him  and  placed  in  the  Berlin  Museum.  Others  passed  hither  and  thither  (a  few  to  Kings- 
borough),  but  not  in  a way  to  obscure  their  paths,  so  that  when,  in  1830,  Aubin  was  sent 
to  Mexico  by  the  French  government,  he  was  able  to  secure  a considerable  portion  of 
them,  as  the  result  of  searches  during  the  next  ten  years.  It  was  with  the  purpose,  some 


LORENZO  BOTURINI* 


but  still  interesting  as  illustrating  legal  and  ad- 
ministrative processes  used  in  later  times,  in  the 
relations  of  the  Spaniards  with  the  natives  ; and 
still  others  embracing  Christian  prayers,  cate- 
chisms, etc.,  employed  by  the  missionaries  in  the 
religious  instruction  (Aubin,  Notice , etc.,  21). 
Humboldt  (vol.  xiii.,  pi.  p.  141)  gives  “a  law- 
suit in  hieroglyphics.” 

There  was  published  (100  copies)  at  Madrid, 


in  1878,  Pintura  del  Gobernador,  Alcaldes y Regi- 
dores  de  Mexico,  Codice  en  geroglificos  Mexicanos 
y en  lengua  Castellana  y Azteca,  Existente  en  la 
Biblioteca  del  Excmo  Seiior  Duque  de  Osuna,  — 
a legal  record  of  the  later  Spanish  courts  affect- 
ing the  natives. 

1 Humboldt  describes  these  collections  which 
he  knew  at  the  beginning  of  the  century,  speaking 
of  Jose  Antonio  Pichardo’s  as  the  finest. 


* After  a lithograph  in  Cumplido’s  Mexican  edition  of  Prescott’s  Mexico.  There  is  an  etched  portrait  in 
the  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Americaine  de  France,  nouvelle  serie , i.,  which  is  accompanied  by  an  essay  on  this 
“ P&re  de  l’Americanisme,”  and  “ les  sources  aux  quelles  il  a puise  son  precis  d’histoire  Americaine,’  by 
L6on  Cahun. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


161 


years  later,  of  assisting  in  the  elucidation  and  publication  of  Aubin’s  collection  that  the 
Socidtd  Amdricaine  de  France  was  established.  The  collection  of  historical  records,  as 


FRONTISPIECE  OF  BOTURINI’S  IDEA. 


. — II 


VOL.  I, 


i62 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Aubin  held  it,  was  described,  in  1881,  by  himself,1  when  he  divided  his  Mexican  picture- 
writings  into  two  classes,  — those  which  had  belonged  to  Boturini,  and  those  which  had 
not.'2  Aubin  at  the  same  time  described  his  collection  of  the  Spanish  MSS.  of  Ixtlilxo- 
chitl,3  while  he  congratulated  himself  that  he  had  secured  the  old  picture-writings  upon 
which  that  native  writer  depended  in  the  early  part  of  his  Historia  Chichimeca.  These 
Spanish  MSS.  bear  the  signature  and  annotations  of  Veytia. 

We  have  another  description  of  the  Aubin  collection  by  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg.4 


1  Notice  sur  une  collection  d'antiquites  Mexi- 
caines,  being  an  extract  from  a Memoire  sur  la 
peinture  didactique  et  V Ecriture  figurative  des 
Anciens  Mexicains  (Paris,  1851  ; again,  1859- 
1861).  Cf.  papers  in  Revue  Americaine  et  Ori- 
entate, 1st  ser.,  iii.,  iv.,  and  v.  Aubin  says  that 
Humboldt  found  that  part  of  the  Boturini  collec- 
tion which  had  been  given  over  to  the  Mexi- 
can archivists  diminished  by  seven  eighths.  He 
also  shows  how  Ternaux-Compans  (Crauates 
Horribles,  p.  275-289),  Rafael  Isidro  Gondra  (in 
Veytia,  Hist.  Ant.  de  Mex.,  1836,  i.  49),  and  Bus- 
tamante have  related  the  long  contentions  over 
the  disposition  of  these  relics,  and  how  the  Acad- 
emy of  History  at  Madrid  had  even  secured  the 
suppression  of  a similar  academy  among  the 
antiquaries  in  Mexico,  which  had  been  formed 
to  develop  the  study  of  their  antiquities.  It  was 
as  a sort  of  peace  - offering  that  the  Spanish 
king  now  caused  Veytia  to  be  empowered  to 
proceed  with  the  work  which  Boturini  had  be- 
gun. This  allayed  the  irritation  for  a while,  but 
on  Veytia’s  death  (1769)  it  broke  out  again,  when 
Gama  was  given  possession  of  the  collection, 
which  he  further  increased.  It  was  at  Gama’s 
death  sold  at  auction,  when  Humboldt  bought 
the  specimens  which  are  now  in  Berlin,  and 
Waldeck  secured  others  which  he  took  to  Eu- 
rope. It  was  from  Waldeck  that  Aubin  ac- 
quired the  Boturini  part  of  his  collection.  The 
rest  of  the  collection  remained  in  Mexico,  and 
in  the  main  makes  a part  at  present  of  the  Museo 
Nacional.  But  Aubin  is  a doubtful  witness. 

Aubin  says  that  he  now  proposed  to  refashion 
the  Boturini  collection  by  copies  where  he  could 
not  procure  the  originals;  to  add  others,  em- 
bracing whatever  he  could  still  find  in  the  hands 
of  the  native  population,  and  what  had  been 
collected  by  Veytia,  Gama,  and  Pichardo.  In 
1851,  when  he  wrote,  Aubin  had  given  twenty 
years  to  this  task,  and  with  what  results  the  list 
of  his  MSS.,  which  he  appends  to  the  account 
we  have  quoted,  will  show. 

These  include  in  the  native  tongue  : — 

a.  History  of  Mexico  from  A.  D.  1064  to  1521, 
in  fragments,  from  Tezozomoc  and  from  Alonso 
Franco,  annotated  by  Domingo  Chimalpain  (a 
copy).  , 

b.  Annals  of  Mexico,  written  apparently  in 
1528  by  one  who  had  taken  part  in  the  defence 
of  Mexico  (an  original). 

c.  Several  historical  narratives  on  European 
paper,  by  Domingo  Chimalpain,  coming  down 


to  a.  d.  1591,  which  have  in  great  part  been 
translated  by  Aubin,  who  considers  them  the 
most  important  documents  which  we  possess. 

d.  A history  of  Colhuacan  and  Mexico,  lack- 
ing the  first  leaf.  This  is  described  as  being 
in  the  handwriting  of  Ixtlilxochitl,  and  Aubin 
gives  the  dates  of  its  composition  as  1563  and 
1570.  It  is  what  has  later  been  known  as  the 
Codex  Chimalpopoca. 

e.  Zapata’s  history  of  Tlaxcalla. 

f.  A copy  by  Loaysa  of  an  original,  from 
which  Torquemada  has  copied  several  chapters. 

2 The  chief  of  the  Boturini  acquisition  he 
enumerates  as  follows : — 

a.  Toltec  annals  on  fifty  leaves  of  European 
paper,  cited  by  Gama  in  hisr  Descripcion  histo- 
rica.  Cf.  Brasseur,  Nations  Civilisees,  p.  lxxvi. 

b.  Chichimec  annals,  on  Indian  paper,  six 
leaves,  of  which  ten  pages  consist  of  pictures, 
the  original  so-called  Codex  Chimalpopoca,  of 
which  Gama  made  a copy,  also  in  the  Aubin  col- 
lection, as  well  as  IxtlilxochitPs  explanation  of 
it.  Aubin  says  that  he  has  used  this  account  of 
Ixtlilxochitl  to  rectify  that  historian’s  blunders. 

c.  Codex  on  Indian  paper,  having  a picture  of 
the  Emperor  Xolotl. 

d.  A painting  on  prepared  skin,  giving  the 
genealogy  of  the  Chichimecan  chiefs,  accom- 
panied by  the  copies  made  by  Pichardo  and 
Boturini.  Cf.  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer.  de 
France , 2d  ser.,  i.  283. 

e.  A synchronical  history  of  Tepechpan  and  of 
Mexico,  on  Indian  paper,  accompanied  by  a 
copy  made  by  Pichardo  and  an  outline  sketch 
of  that  in  the  Museo  Nacional. 

Without  specifying  others  which  Aubin  enu- 
merates, he  gives  as  other  acquisitions  the  fol- 
lowing in  particular : — 

a.  Pichardo’s  copy  of  a Codex  Mexicanus, 
giving  the  history  of  the  Mexicans  from  their 
leaving  Aztlan  to  1590. 

b.  An  original  Mexican  history  from  the  de- 
parture from  Aztlan  to  1569. 

c.  Fragments  which  had  belonged  to  Sigii- 
enza. 

3 Notice  sur  une  Collection,  etc.,  p.  12. 

4 Hist,  des  Nations  Civilisees  (i.  pp.  xxxi,  lxxvi, 
etc. ; cf.  Muller’s  Chips,  i.  317,  320>  323>-  Bras‘ 
seur  in  the  same  place  describes  his  own  collec- 
tion ; and  it  may  be  further  followed  in  his  Btbl. 
Mex.- Guat.,  and  in  the  Pinait  Catalogue.  Dr. 
Brinton  says  that  we  owe  much  for  the  preserva- 
tion during  late  years  of  Maya  MSS.  to  Don 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


163 


If  we  allow  the  first  place  among  native  writers,  using  the  Spanish  tongue,  to  Ixtlilxo- 
chitl,  we  find  several  others  of  considerable  service  : Diego  Munoz  Camargo,  a Tlaxcallan 
Mestizo,  wrote  (1585)  a Historia  de  Tlaxcallan.1  Tezozomoc’s  Cronica  Mexicana  is 
probably  best  known  through  Ternaux’s  version,2  and  there  is  an  Italian  abridgment  in 
F.  C.  Marmocchi’s  Raccolta  di  Viaggi  (vol.  x.).  The  catalogue  of  Boturini  discloses  a 


1CAZBALCETA* 


Juan  Pio  Perez,  and  that  the  best  existing  col- 
lection of  them  is  that  of  Canon  Crescencio 
Carrillo  y Ancona.  Jose  F.  Ramirez  (see  Vol. 
II.  p.  398)  is  another  recent  Mexican  collector, 
and  his  MSS.  have  been  in  one  place  and  another 
in  the  market  of  late  years.  Quaritch’s  recent 
catalogues  reveal  a number  of  them,  includ- 
ing his  own  MS.  Catdlogo  de  Colecciones  (Jan., 
1888,  no.  171),  and  some  of  his  unpublished 
notes  on  Prescott,  not  included  in  those  “notas  y 
ecclarecimientos  ” appended  to  Navarro’s  trans- 
lation of  the  Conquest  of  Mexico  (CataL,  1885, 
no.  28,502).  The  several  publications  of  Leon 
de  Rosny  point  us  to  scattered  specimens.  In 
his  Doc.  Icrits  de  /’ Antiquite  Amer.  he  gives  the 
fac-simile  of  a colored  Aztec  map.  A MS.  in 
the  collection  of  the  Corps  Legislatif,  in  Paris, 
and  that  of  the  Codex  Indiae  Meridionalis  are 
figured  in  his  Essai  sur  le  dlchiffrement , etc.  (pi. 


ix,  x).  In  the  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer.  de  France , 
n.  s.,  vol.  i.,  etc.,  we  find  plates  of  the  Mappe 
Tlotzin,  and  a paper  of  Madier  de  Montjau, 
“ sur  quelques  manuscrits  figuratifs  de  l’Ancien 
Mexique.”  Cf.  also  Anales  del  Museo,  viii. 

Cf.  for  further  mention  of  collections  the  Re- 
vue Orientate  et  Americaine  ; Cyrus  Thomas  in 
the  Am.  Antiquarian , May,  1S84  (vol.  vi.) ; and 
the  more  comprehensive  enumeration  in  the  in- 
troduction to  Domenech’s  Manuscrit  pictogra- 
phique.  Orozco  y Berra,  in  the  introduction  to 
his  Geografia  de  las  Lenguas  y Carta  Etnogrdfica 
(Mexico,  1864),  speaks  of  the  assistance  he  ob- 
tained from  the  collections  of  Ramirez  and  of 
Icazbalceta. 

1 See  Vol.  II.  p.  41S. 

2 See  Vol.  II.  p.  418.  Bandelier  calls  this 
French  version  “utterly  unreliable.” 


* [After  a photograph  kindly  furnished  by  himself  at  the  editor’s  request.  — Ed.] 


164  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


MS.  by  a Cacique  of  Quiahuiztlan,  Juan  Ventura  Zapata  y Mendoza,  which  brings  the 
Cronica  de  la  muy  noble  y real  Ciudad  de  Tlaxcallan  from  the  earliest  times  down  to 
1689;  but  it  is  not  now  known.  Torquemada  and  others  cite  two  native  Tezcucan  writers, 
— Juan  Bautista  Pomar,  whose  Relacion  de  las  Antigiiedades  de  los  Indios  1 treats  of  the 
manners  of  his  ancestors,  and  Antonio  Pimentel,  whose  Relaciones  are  well  known.  The 
MS.  Crdnica  Mexicana  of  Anton  Munon  Chimalpain  (b.  1579),  tracing  the  annals  from 
the  eleventh  century,  is  or  was  among  the  Aubin  MSS.1 2 3  There  was  collected  before  1536, 
under  the  orders  of  Bishop  Zumarraga,  a number  of  aboriginal  tales  and  traditions,  which 
under  the  title  of  Historia  de  los  Mexicanos  for  sus  Pinturas  was  printed  by  Icazbalceta, 
who  owns  the  MS.,  in  the  Anales  del  Museo  Nacional  (ii.  no.  2).8 


As  regards  Yucatan,  Brasseur  4 speaks  of  the  scantiness  of  the  historical  material,  and 
Brinton5  does  not  know  a single  case  where  a Maya  author  has  written  in  the  Spanish 
tongue,  as  the  Aztecs  did,  under  Spanish  influence.  We  owe  more  to  Dr.  Daniel  Gar- 
rison Brinton  than  to  any  one  else  for  the  elucidation  of  the  native  records,  and  he  had 
had  the  advantage  of  the  collection  of  Yucatan  MSS.  formed  by  Dr.  C.  H.  Berendt,6 
which,  after  that  gentleman’s  death,  passed  into  Brinton’s  hands. 

After  the  destruction  of  the  ancient  records  by  Landa,  considerable  efforts  were  made 
throughout  Yucatan,  in  a sort  of  reactionary  spirit,  to  recall  the  lingering  recollections 
of  what  these  manuscripts  contained.  The  grouping  of  such  recovered  material  became 
known  as  Chilan  Balam.7  It  is  from  local  collections  of  this  kind  that  Brinton  selected  the 
narratives  which  he  has  published  as  The  Maya  Chronicles , being  the  first  volume  of  his 
Library  of  Aboriginal  American  Literature.  The  original  texts  8 are  accompanied  by  an 
English  translation.  One  of  the  books,  the  Chilan  Balam  of  Mani,  had  been  earlier  printed 
by  Stephens,  in  his  Yucatan.9  The  only  early  Spanish  chronicle  is  Bishop  Landa’s  Rela- 
tion des  choses  de  Yucatan}9  which  follows  not  an  original,  but  a copy  of  the  bishop’s 
text,  written,  as  Brasseur  thinks,  thirty  years  after  Landa’s  death,  or  about  1610,  and 
which  Brasseur  first  brought  to  the  world’s  attention  when  he  published  his  edition,  with 
both  Spanish  and  French  texts,  at  Paris,  in  1864.  The  MS.  seems  to  have  been  incom- 


1 This  is  Beristain’s  title.  Torquemada,  Ve- 
tancurt,  and  Sigiienza  cite  it  as  Memorias  his- 
ioricas  ; Brasseur,  Bib.  Mexico-Guat.,  p.  122. 

2 Cf.  “ Les  Annales  Mexicaines,”  by  Remi 
Simeon  in  the  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer.  de 
France , n.  s.,  vol.  ii. 

3 It  is  cited  by  Chavero  as  Codex  Zumarraga. 

4 Hist.  Nat.  Civ.,  ii.  577. 

5 Aboriginal  Amer.  Authors,  p.  29.  Cf.  Ban- 
delier’s  Bibliography  of  Yucatan  in  Am.  Antiq. 
Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s.,  vol.  i.  p.  82.  Cf.  the  references 
in  Brasseur,  Hist.  Nat.  Civ.,  and  in  Bancroft, 
Nat.  Races,  v. 

6 Cf.  Mem.  of  Berendt,  by  Brinton  (Worcester, 
1884). 

7 Cf.  Brinton  on  the  MSS.  in  the  languages  of 
Cent.  America,  in  Amer.  Jour,  of  Science,'  xcv ii. 
222  ; and  his  Books  of  Chilan  Balam,  the  pro- 
phetic and  historical  records  of  the  Mayas  of 
Yucatan  (Philad.,  1882),  reprinted  from  the  Penn 
Monthly,  March,  1882.  Cf.  also  the  Transac- 
tions of  the  Philad.  Numismatic  and  Antiqua- 
rian Soc. 

8 This  is  in  the  alphabet  adopted  by  the  early 

missionaries.  The  volume  contains  the  “ Books 
of  Chilan  Balam,”  written  “ not  later  than  1595,” 
and  also  the  “ Chac  Xulub  Chen,”  written  by  a 


Maya  chief,  Nakuk  Pech,  in  1562,  to  recount  the 
story  of  the  Spanish  conquest  of  Yucatan. 

9 This  was  in  1843,  when  Stephens  made  his 
English  translation  from  Pio  Perez’s  Spanish 
version,  Antigua  Chronologia  Yucateca ; and 
from  Stephens’s  text,  Brasseur  gave  it  a French 
rendering  in  his  edition  of  Landa.  (Cf.  also  his 
Nat.  Civilisees,  ii.  p.  2.)  Perez,  who  in  Stephens’s 
opinion  (Yucatan,  ii.  117)  was  the  best  Maya 
scholar  in  that  country,  made  notes,  which  Valen- 
tini  published  in  his  “ Katunes  of  Maya  History,” 
in  the  Pro.  of  the  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.,  Oct.,  1879 
(Worcester,  1880),  but  they  had  earlier  been 
printed  in  Carrillo’s  Hist,  y Geog.  de  Yucatan 
(Merida,  1881).  Bancroft  (Nat.  Races,  v.  624) 
reprints  Stephens’s  text  with  notes  from  Bras- 
seur. 

The  books  of  Chilan  Balam  were  used  both 
by  Cogolludo  and  Lizana  ; and  Brasseur  printed 
some  of  them  in  the  Mission  Scientifque  au 
Mexique.  They  are  described  in  Carrillo’s  Di- 
sertacion  sobre  la  historia  de  lengua  Maya  6 Yu- 
cateca (Merida,  1870). 

10  Brasseur,  Bib.  Mex.-Guat.,  p.  30.  See  Vol. 
II.  p.  429.  The  Spanish  title  is  Relacion  de  las 
Cosas  de  Yucatan. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


165 


plete,  and  was  perhaps  inaccurately  copied  at  the  time.  At  this  date  (1864)  Brasseur  had 
become  an  enthusiast  for  his  theory  of  the  personification  of  the  forces  of  nature  in  the  old 
recitals,  and  there  was  some  distrust  how  far  his  zeal  had  affected  his  text;  and  more- 
over he  had  not  published  the  entire  text,  but  had  omitted  about  one  sixth.  Brasseur’s 
method  of  editing  became  apparent  when,  in  1884,  at  Madrid,  Juan  de  Dios  de  la  Rada  y 
Delgado  published  literally  the  whole  Spanish  text,  as  an  appendix  to  the  Spanish  transla- 
tion of  Rosny’s  essay  on  the  hieratic  writing.  The  Spanish  editor  pointed  out  some  but 
not  all  the  differences  between  his  text  and  Brasseur’s,  — a scrutiny  which  Brinton  has 
perfected  in  his  Critical  Remarks  on  the  Editions  of  Lancia's  Writings  (Philad.,  1887).1 


PROFESSOR  DANIEL  G.  BRINTON. 

Landa  gives  extracts  from  a work  by  Bernardo  Lizana,  relating  to  Yucatan,  of  which  it 
is  difficult  to  get  other  information.2  The  earliest  published  historical  narrative  was 
Cogolludo’s  Historia  de  Yucathan  (Madrid,  1688). 3 Stephens,  in  his  study  of  the  subject. 


1 From  the  Proc.  of  the  Amer.  Philos.  Soc., 
xxiv. 

2 Cf.  Bandelier  in  Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s., 
vol.  i.  p.  88. 

8 The  second  edition  was  called  Los  tres  Sig- 
los  de  la  Dominacion  Espahola  en  Yucatan  (Cam- 
peche and  Merida,  2 vols.,  1842,  1845).  It  was 
edited  unsatisfactorily  by  Justo  Sierra.  Cf.  Vol. 
II.  p.  429;  Brasseur,  Bib.  Mex.-Guat.,  p.  47. 

This,  like  Juan  de  Villagutierre  Soto-Mayor’s 
Historia  de  la  Conquista  de  la  Provincia  de  el 
Itza,  reduction,  y progresses  de  la  de  el  Lacandon , 
y otras  naciones  de  Indios  Barbaros , de  la  media- 


cion  de  cl  Reyno  de  Gautimala,  a las  Provincias 
de  Yucatan , en  la  America  Septentrional  (Madrid, 
1701),  (which,  says  Bandelier,  is  of  importance 
for  that  part  of  Yucatan  which  has  remained  un- 
explored), has  mostly  to  do  with  the  Indians 
under  the  Spanish  rule,  but  the  books  are  not 
devoid  of  usefulness  in  the  study  of  the  early 
tribes. 

Of  the  modern  comments  on  the  Yucatan  an- 
cient history,  those  of  Brasseur  in  his  Nations 
Civil  isles  are  more  to  be  trusted  than  his  in- 
troduction to  his  edition  of  Landa,  which  needs 
to  be  taken  with  due  recognition  of  his  later 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


1 66 


speaks  of  it  as  “voluminous,  confused,  and  ill-digested,”  and  says  “it  might  almost  be 
called  a history  of  the  Franciscan  friars,  to  which  order  Cogolludo  belonged.”  1 

The  native  sources  of  the  aboriginal  history  of  Guatemala,  and  of  what  is  sometimes 
called  the  Quiche-Cakchiquel  Empire,  are  not  abundant,2  but  the  most  important  are  the 
Popul  Vuh,  a traditional  book  of  the  Quiches,  and  the  Memorial  de  Tecpa ti-A titlan . 

The  Popul  Vuh  was  discovered  in  the  library  of  the  university  at  Guatemala,  probably 
not  far  from  1700, 3 by  Francisco  Ximenez,  a missionary  in  a mountain  village  of  the 
country.  Ximenez  did  not  find  the  original  Quichd  book,  but  a copy  of  it,  made  after  it 
was  lost,  and  later  than  the  Conquest,  which  we  may  infer  was  reproduced  from  memory 
to  replace  the  lost  text,  and  in  this  way  it  may  have  received  some  admixture  of  Christian 
thought.4  It  was  this  sort  of  a text  that  Ximenez  turned  into  Spanish  ; and  this  version, 
with  the  copy  of  the  Quichd,  which  Ximenez  also  made,  is  what  has  come  down  to  us. 
Karl  Scherzer,  a German  traveller5  in  the  country,  found  Ximenez’  work,  which  had 
seemingly  passed  into  the  university  library  on  the  suppression  of  the  monasteries,  and 
which,  as  he  supposes,  had  not  been  printed  because  of  some  disagreeable  things  in 
it  about  the  Spanish  treatment  of  the  natives.  Scherzer  edited  the  MS.,  which  was 
published  as  Las  Historias  del  Origen  de  los  Indios  de  Esta  Provincia  de  Guatemala  6 
(Vienna,  1857). 

Brasseur,  who  had  seen  the  Ximenez  MSS.  in  1855,  considered  the  Spanish  version 
untrustworthy,  and  so  with  the  aid  of  some  natives  he  gave  it  a French  rendering,  and 
republished  it  a few  years  later  as  Popol  Vuh.  Le  Livre  sacre  et  les  Mythes  de  V antiquite 
americaine , avec  les  livres  heroiques  et  historiques  des  Quiches.  Ouvrage  original  des 
indigenes  de  Guatemala,  texte  Quiche  et  trad,  fran^aise  en  regard,  accompagnee  de  notes 
philologiques  et  d'un  commentaire  stir  la  mythologie  et  les  migrations  des  peitples  anciens 
de  PA 7/ierique,  etc.,  compose  sur  des  documents  originaux  et  inedits  (Paris,  1861). 

Brasseurs  introduction  bears  the  special  title  : Dissertation  sur  les  mythes  de  P antiquiti 
Americaine  sur  la  probability  des  Communications  existant  anciennement d'un  Continent 
a P autre,  et  sur  les  migrations  des  peuples  indigenes  de  P Amerique,  — in  which  he  took 
occasion  to  elucidate  his  theory  of  cataclysms  and  Atlantis.  He  speaks  of  his  annota- 
tions as  the  results  of  his  observations  among  the  Quiches  and  of  his  prolonged  studies. 
He  calls  the  Popul  Vuh  rather  a national  than  a sacred  book,7  and  thinks  it  the  original  in 


vagaries  ; and  Brinton  has  studied  their  history 
at  some  length  in  the  introduction  to  his  Maya 
Chronicles.  The  first  volume  of  Eligio  Ancona’s 
Hist,  de  Yucatan  covers  the  early  period.  See 
Vol.  II.  p.  429.  Brinton  calls  it  “disappoint- 
ingly superficial.”  There  is  much  that  is  popu- 
larly retrospective  in  the  various  and  not  always 
stable  contributions  of  Dr.  Le  Plongeon  and 
his  wife.  The  last  of  Mrs.  Le  Plongeon’s  pa- 
pers is  one  on  “ The  Mayas,  their  customs, 
laws,  religion,”  in  the  Mag.  Anier.  Hist.,  Aug., 
1S87.  Bancroft’s  second  volume  groups  the  ne- 
cessary references  to  every  phase  of  Maya  his- 
tory. Cf.  Chamay,  English  translation,  ch.  15; 
and  Geronimo  Castillo’s  Diccionario  Historico, 
biografico  y monumental  de  Yucatan  (Merida, 
1866).  Of  Crescencio  Carrillo  and  his  Historia 
Antigua  de  Yucatan  (Merida,  1881),  Brinton 
says  : “ I know  of  no  other  Yucatecan  who  has 
equal  enthusiasm  or  so  just  an  estimate  of  the 
antiquarian  riches  of  his  native  land”  ( Amer . 
Hero  Myths,  147).  Bastian  summarizes  the  his- 
tory of  Yucatan  and  Guatemala  in  the  second 
volume  of  his  Cidturlander  des  alien  Amenka. 

1  Yucatan,  ii.  79. 


2 See  C.  H.  Berendt  on  the  hist.  docs,  of  Guar 
temala  in  Smithsonian  Report,  1876.  There  is  a 
partial  bibliography  of  Guatemala  in  W.  T. 
Brigham’s  Guatetnala  the  land  of  the  Quetzal 
(N.  Y.,  1887),  and  another  by  Bandelier  in  the 
Am.  Atitiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s.,  vol.  i.  p.  101.  The 
references  in  Brasseur’s  Hist.  Nations  Civilis'ees, 
and  in  Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  vol.  v.,  will  be  a 
ready  means  for  collating  the  early  sources. 

3 Scherzer  and  Brasseur  are  somewhat  at  vari- 
ance here. 

4 “ There  are  some  coincidences  between  the 
• Old  Testament  and  the  Quiche  MS.  which  are 

certainly  startling.”  Muller’s  Chips,  i.  328. 

5 Wanderungen  durch  die  mittel  - Amenkam- 
scheti  Freistaaten  (Braunschweig,  1857  — an  Eng- 
lish translation,  London,  1857). 

6 Leclerc,  no.  1305. 

7 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Nat.  Races,  ii.  115;  m->  ch. 
2,  and  v.  170,  547,  gives  a convenient  condensa- 
tion of  the  book,  and  says  that  Muller  miscon- 
ceives in  some  parts  of  his  summary,  and  that 
Baldwin  in  his  Ancient  America,  p.  191,  follows 
Muller.  Helps,  Spanish  Conquest,  iv.  App.,  gives 
a brief  synopsis,  — the  first  one  done  in  English. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


167 


some  part  of  the  “ Livre  divin  des  Tolteques,”  the  Teo-Amoxtli.1  Brinton  avers  that 
neither  Ximenez  nor  Brasseur  has  adequately  translated  the  Quichd  text,2  and  sees  no 
reason  to  think  that  the  matter  has  been  in  any  way  influenced  by  the  Spanish  contact, 
emanating  indeed  long  before  that  event ; and  he  has  based  some  studies  upon  it.3  In 
this  opinion  Bandelier  is  at  variance,  at  least  as  regards  the  first  portion,  for  he  believes 
it  to  have  been  written  after  the  Conquest  and  under  Christian  influences.4  Brasseur  in 
some  of  his  other  writings  has  further  discussed  the  matter.5 

The  Memorial  of  Tecpan  - Atitlan,  to  use  Brasseur’s  title,  is  an  incomplete  MS.,6 
found  in  1844  by  Juan  Gavarrete  in  rearranging  the  MSS.  of  the  convent  of  San  Fran- 
cisco, of  Guatemala,  and  it  was  by  Gavarrete  that  a Spanish  version  of  Brasseur’s  ren- 
dering was  printed  in  1873  in  the  Boletin  de  la  Sociedad  economica  de  Guatetnala  (nos. 
29-43).  This  translation  by  Brasseur,  made  in  1856,  was  never  printed  by  him,  but,  pass- 
ing into  Pinart’s  hands  with  Brasseur’s  collections,7  it  was  entrusted  by  that  collector  to 
Dr.  Brinton,  who  selected  the  parts  of  interest  (46  out  of  96  pp.),and  included  it  as  vol.  vi. 
in  his  Library  of  Aboriginal  American  Literature , under  the  title  of  The  annals  of  the 
Cakchiquels.  The  original  text , with  a translation,  notes,  and  introduction  (Philadel- 
phia, 1885). 

Brinton  disagrees  with  Brasseur  in  placing  the  date  of  its  beginning  towards  the  open- 
ing of  the  eleventh  century,  and  puts  it  rather  at  about  a.  d.  1380.  Brasseur  says  he 
received  the  original  from  Gavarrete,  and  it  would  seem  to  have  been  a copy  made  be- 
tween 1626  and  1650,  though  it  bears  internal  evidence  of  having  been  written  by  one 
who  was  of  adult  age  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest. 

Brinton’s  introduction  discusses  the  ethnological  position  of  the  Cakchiquels,  who  he 
thinks  had  been  separated  from  the  Mayas  for  a long  period. 

The  next  in  importance  of  the  Guatemalan  books  is  the  work  of  Francisco  Antonio  de 
Fuentes  y Guzman,  Historia  de  Guatemala , 6 Recordacion  florida  escrita  el  siglo  xvii.,  que 
publica  por  primera  vez  con  notas  e ilustraciones  J.  Zaragoza  (Madrid,  1882-83),  being 
vols.  1 and  2 of  the  Biblioteca  de  los  americanislas.  The  original  MS.,  dated  1690,  is  in 
the  archives  of  the  city  of  Guatemala.  Owing  to  a tendency  of  the  author  to  laud  the 


1 Max  Muller  dissents  from  this.  Chips,  i. 
326.  Muller  reminds  us,  if  we  are  suspicious  of 
the  disjointed  manner  of  what  has  come  down 
to  us  as  the  Popid  Vuh,  that  “ consecutive  his- 
tory is  altogether  a modern  idea,  of  which  few 
only  of  the  ancient  nations  had  any  conception. 
If  we  had  the  exact  words  of  the  Popiil  Vuh,  we 
should  probably  find  no  more  history  there  than 
we  find  in  the  Quichd  MS.  as  it  now  stands.” 

2 Cf.  Aborig.  Atner.  Authors,  p.  33. 

3 The  names  of  the  gods  in  the  Kiche  Myths 
of  Central  America  (Philad.,  1881),  from  the 
Proc.  Amer.  Philos.  Soc.  He  gives  his  reasons 
(p.  4)  for  the  spelling  Kiche. 

4 Cf.  Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s.,  vol.  i.  109; 
and  his  paper,  “ On  the  Sources  of  the  Aborig- 
inal Hist,  of  Spanish  America,”  in  the  Am. 
Asso.  Adv.  Sci.  Proc.,  xxvii.  328  (Aug.,  1878). 

In  the  Peabody  Mus.  Eleventh  Report,  p.  391,  he 
says  of  it  that  “ it  appears  to  be  for  the  first 
chapters  an  evident  fabrication,  or  at  least  ac- 
commodation of  Indian  mythology  to  Christian 
notions,  — a pious  fraud;  but  the  bulk  is  an 
equally  evident  collection  of  original  traditions 
of  the  Indians  of  Guatemala,  and  as  such  the 

most  valuable  work  for  the  aboriginal  history 

and  ethnology  of  Central  America.” 


6 Hist.  Nat.  Civ.,  i.  47.  S' il  existe  des  sources  de 
Phistoire  primitive  du  Mexique  dans  les  monu- 
ments fgyptiens  et  de  Phistoire  primitive  de  Pancien 
monde  dans  les  monuments  Americains  ? (1864), 
which  is  an  extract  from  his  Lauda's  Relation. 
Cf.  Bollaert,  in  the  Royal  Soc.  of  Lit.  Trans., 
1863.  Brasseur  (Bib.  Mcx.-Guat.,  p.  45 ; Pinart, 
no.  231)  also  speaks  of  another  Quiche  docu- 
ment, of  which  his  MS.  copy  is  entitled  Titido 
de  los  Sehores  de  Totonicapan,  escrito  en  lengua 
Quiche,  el  aho  de  Ijj4,  y traducido  al  Castellano 
el  anode  1834, por  el  Padre  Dionisio  fose  Chonay, 
indtgena,  which  tells  the  story  of  the  Quiche 
race  somewhat  differently  from  the  Popul  Vuh. 

6 See  Vol.  II.  p.  419. 

7 It  stands  in  Brasseur’s  Bib.  Mex.-Guat.,  p, 
13,  as  Memorial  de  Tecpan- Atitlan  ( Solola ),  his- 
toire  des  deux  families  royales  du  royaume  des 
Cakchiquels  d'Lximche  ou  Guatemala,  rldigl  en 
langue  Cakchiqulle  par  le  prince  Don  Francisco 
Ernantez  Arana-Xahila,  des  rois  Ahpozotziles, 
where  Brasseur  speaks  of  it  as  analogous  to  the 
Popid  Vuh,  but  with  numerous  and  remarkable 
variations.  The  MS.  remained  in  the  keeping 
of  Xahila  till  1562,  when  Francisco  Gebuta 
Queh  received  it  and  continued  it  ( Pinart  Cata- 
logue, no.  35). 


1 68  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 

natives,  modern  historians  have  looked  with  some  suspicion  on  his  authority,  and  have 
pointed  out  inconsistencies  and  suspected  errors.1  Of  a later  writer,  Ramon  de  Ordonez 
(died  about  1840),  we  have  only  the  rough  draught  of  a Historia  de  la  creacion  del  Cielo y 
delatierra,  conforme  al  sistema  de  la  gentilidad  A mericana,  which  is  of  importance  for 
traditions.2 *  This  manuscript,  preserved  in  the  Museo  Nacional  in  Mexico,  is  all  that  now 
exists,  representing  the  perfected  work.  Brasseur  {Bib.  Mex.-Guat.,  113)  had  a copy  of 
this  draught  (made  in  1848-49).  The  original  fair  copy  was  sent  to  Madrid  for  the  press, 
and  it  is  suspected  that  the  Council  for  the  Indies  suppressed  it  in  1805.  Ramon  cites  a 
manuscript  Hist,  de  la  Prov.  de  San  Vicente  de  Chiappas y Goathemala,  which  is  perhaps 
the  same  as  the  Cronica  de  la  Prov.  de  Chiapas  y Guatemala , of  which  the  seventh  book 
is  in  the  Museo  Nacional  {Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc .,  n.  s.,  i.  97;  Brasseur,  Bib.  Mex.-Gnat., 
1 57)- 

The  work  of  Antonio  de  Remesal  is  sometimes  cited  as  Historia  general  de  las  Indias 
occidetitales , y particular  de  la  gober?iacion  de  Chiapas y Guatemala , and  sometimes  as 
Historia  de  la  provincia  de  San  Vicente  de  Chyapay  Guatemala  (Madrid,  1619,  1620).8 


Bandelier  {Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  i.  95)  has  indicated  the  leading  sources  of  the  his- 
tory of  Chiapas,  so  closely  associated  with  Guatemala.  To  round  the  study  of  the  abo- 
riginal period  of  this  Pacific  region,  we  may  find  something  in  Alvarado’s  letters  on  the 
Conquest;4  in  Las  Casas  for  the  interior  parts,  and  in  Alonso  de  Zurita’s  Relacion,  1560, 5 
as  respects  the  Quichd  tribes,  which  is  the  source  of  much  in  Herrera.6 *  For  Oajaca  (Oa- 
xaca, Guaxaca)  the  special  source  is  Francisco  de  Burgoa’s  Geogrdfica  descripcion  de  la 
parte  septentrional  del  Polo  Artico  de  la  America,  etc.  (Mexico,  1674),  'n  two  quarto  vol- 
umes, — or  at  least  it  is  generally  so  regarded.  Bandelier,  who  traces  the  works  on  Oajaca 
{Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s.,  i.  115),  says  there  is  a book  of  a modern  writer,  Juan  B. 
Carriedo,  which  follows  Burgoa  largely.  Brasseur  {Bib.  Mex.-Guat.,  p.  33)  speaks  of 
Burgoa  as  the  only  source  which  remains  of  the  native  history  of  Oajaca.  He  says  it  is  a 
very  rare  book,  even  in  Mexico.  He  largely  depends  upon  its  full  details  in  some  parts 
of  his  Nations  Civilisees  (iii.  livre  9).  Alonso  de  la  Rea’s  Cronica  de  Mechoacan  (Mexico, 
1648)  and  Basalenque’s  Cronica  de  San  Augustin  de  Mechoacan  (Mexico,  1673)  are  books 
which  Brinton  complains  he  could  find  in  no  library  in  the  United  States. 


1  See  Vol.  II.  419;  Bancroft,  Nat.  Races,  v. 

564;  Bandelier  in  Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  i.  105. 

Bandelier  ( Peabody  Mus.  Repts.,  ii.  391)  says 
that  it  is  now  acknowledged  that  the  Recordacion 
florida  of  Fuentes  y Guzman  is  “full  of  exag- 
gerations and  misstatements.”  Brasseur  {Bib. 
Mex.-Guat.,  pp.  65,  87),  in  speaking  of  Fuentes’ 
Noticia  kistorica  de  los  indios  de  Guatemala  (of 
which  manuscript  he  had  a copy),  says  that  he 
had  access  to  a great  number  of  native  docu- 
ments, but  profited  little  by  them,  either  because 
he  could  not  read  them,  or  his  translators  de- 
ceived him.  Brasseur  adds  that  Fuentes’ account 
of  the  Quiche  rulers  is  “ un  mauvais  roman  qui 
n’a  pas  le  sens  commun.”  This  last  is  a manu- 
script used  by  Domingo  Juarros  in  his  Compen- 
dia de  la  historia  de  la  ciudad  de  Guatemala 

(Guatemala,  1808-18 18,  in  two  vols.  — 1 ecome 

rare),  but  reprinted  in  the  Museo  Guatemalteco, 

1857.  The  English  translation,  by  John  Baily, 

a merchant  living  in  Guatemala,  was  published 
as  a Statistical  and  Commercial  History  of  Guate- 
mala (Lond.,  1823).  Cf.  Vol.  II.  p.  419.  Fran- 
cisco Vazquez  depended  largely  on  native  writ- 
ers in  his  Cronica  de  la  Provincia  de  Guatemala 

(Guatemala,  1714-16).  (See  Vol.  II.  p.  419.) 


2 See  note  in  Bancroft,  iii.  451. 

3 Vol.  II.  419.  Helps  (iii.  300),  speaking  of 
Remesal,  says : “ lie  had  access  to  the  archives 
of  Guatemala  early  in  the  seventeenth  century, 
and  he  is  one  of  those  excellent  writers  so  dear 
to  the  students  of  history,  who  is  not  prone  to 
declamation,  or  rhetoric,  or  picturesque  writing, 
but  indulges  us  largely  by  the  introduction  every- 
where of  most  important  historical  documents, 
copied  boldly  into  the  text.” 

4 Vol.  II.  419. 

5 Vol.  II.  417. 

6 E.  G.  Squier  printed  in  i860  (see  Vol.  II.  p. 
vii.)  Diego  Garcia  de  Palacio’s  Carta  dirigida  al 
Rey  de  Espaha,  aho  ijq6,  under  the  English  title 
of  Description  of  the  ancient  Provinces  of  Guaza- 
cupan,  Izalco,  Cuscatlan,  and  Chiquimula  in  Gua- 
temala, which  is  also  included  in  Pacheco’s  Co- 
leccion,  vol.  vi.  Bandelier  refers  to  Estevan 
Aviles’  Historia  de  Guatemala  desde  los  tiempos 
de  los  Indios  (Guatemala,  1663).  A good  repu- 
tation belongs  to  a modern  work,  Francisco  de 
Paula  Garcia  Pelaez’s  Memorias  para  la  Historia 
del  antiguo  rey  no  de  Guatemala  (Guatemala, 
I^5I~53>  *n  three  vols.). 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA.  1 69 


We  trace  the  aboriginal  condition  of  Nicaragua  in  Peter  Martyr,  Oviedo,  Torquemada, 
and  Ixtlilxochitl.1 


The  earliest  general  account  of  all  these  ancient  peoples  which  we  have  in  English  is 
in  the  History  of  America,  by  William  Robertson,  who  describes  the  condition  of  Mexico 
at  the  time  of  the  Conquest,  and  epitomizes  the  early  Spanish  accounts  of  the  natives. 
Prescott  and  Helps  followed  in  his  steps,  with  new  facilities.  Albert  Gallatin  brought  the 
powers  of  a vigorous  intellect  to  bear,  though  but  cursorily,  upon  the  subject,  in  his 
“ Notes  on  the  semi-civilized  nations  of  Mexico,  Yucatan,  and  Central  America,”  in  the 
Arner.  Ethtiological  Society's  Transactions  (N.  Y.,  1845,  vol.  i.),  and  he  was  about  the 
first  to  recognize  the  dangerous  pitfalls  of  the  pseudo-historical  narratives  of  these  peo- 
ples. The  Native  Races2  of  H.  H.  Bancroft  was  the  first  very  general  sifting  and  massing 
in  English  of  the  great  confusion  of  material  upon  their  condition,  myths,  languages,  an- 
tiquities, and  history.3  The  archaeological  remains  are  treated  by  Stephens  for  Yucatan 
and  Central  America,  by  Dr.  Le  Plongeon  4 for  Yucatan,  by  Ephraim  G.  Squier  for  Nica- 
ragua and  Central  America  in  general,5  by  Adolphe  F.  A.  Bandelier  in  his  communica- 
tions to  the  Peabody  Museum  and  to  the  Archaeological  Institute  of  America,6  and  by 
Professor  Daniel  G.  Brinton  in  his  editing  of  ancient  records  7 and  in  his  mythological 
and  linguistic  studies,  referred  to  elsewhere.  To  these  may  be  added,  as  completing  the 
English  references,  various  .records  of  personal  observations.8 


1 For  details  follow  the  references  in  Bras- 
seur’s  Nat.  Civil.;  Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races ; Ste- 
phens’s Nicaragua,  ii.  305,  etc.  See  the  introd. 
of  Brinton’s  Giiegiience  (Philad.,  1883),  for  the 
Nahuas  and  Mangues  of  Nicaragua. 

2 Leclerc,  no.  1070.  Bancroft  summarized  the 
history  of  these  ancient  peoples  in  his  vol.  ii. 
ch.  2,  and  goes  into  detail  in  his  vol.  v. 

3 He  condenses  the  early  Mexican  history  in 
his  Mexico,  i.  ch.  7.  There  are  recent  condensed 
narratives,  in  which  avail  has  been  had  of  the 
latest  developments,  in  Baldwin’s  Ancient  Amer- 
ica, ch.  4,  and  Short’s  North  Americans  of  An- 
tiqitity. 

4 Mrs.  Alice  D.  Le  Plongeon  has  printed  vari- 
ous summarized  popular  papers,  like  the  “ Con- 
quest of  the  Mayas,”  in  the  Mag.  Amer.  Hist., 
April  and  June,  1888. 

5 A list  of  Squier’s  published  writings  was  ap- 
pended to  the  Catalogue  of  Squier' s Library , 
prepared  by  Joseph  Sabin  (N.  Y.,  1876),  as  sold 
at  that  time.  By  this  it  appears  that  his  earliest 
study  of  these  subjects  was  a review  of  Buxton’s 
Migrations  of  the  Ancient  Mexicans,  read  before 
the  London  Ethnolog.  Soc.,  and  printed  in  1848 
in  the  Edinb.  New  Philosoph.  Mag.,  vol.  xlvi. 
His  first  considerable  contribution  was  his  Trav- 
els in  Cent.  America,  particularly  in  Nicaragua, 
with  a description  of  its  aboriginal  monuments 
(London  and  N.  Y.,  1852-53).  He  supple- 
mented this  by  some  popular  papers  in  Harper's 
Mag.,  1854,  1855.  (Cf.  Hist.  Mag.,  iv.  65  ; Put- 
nam's Mag.,  xii.  549  ) A year  or  two  later  he 
communicated  papers  on  “ Les  Indiens  Guatu- 
sos  du  Nicaragua,”  and  “ Les  indiens  Xicaques 
du  Honduras,”  to  the  Nouvelles  Annales  des 
Voyages  (1856,  1858),  and  “A  Visit  to  the  Gua- 
jiquero  Indians  ” to  Harper's  Mag.,  1859.  In 


i860,  Squier  projected  the  publication  of  a Col- 
lection of  documents,  but  only  a letter  (1576)  of 
Palacio  was  printed  (Icazbalceta,  Bibl.  Mex.,  i. 
p.  326).  He  had  intended  to  make  the  series 
more  correct  and  with  fewer  omissions  than  Ter- 
naux  had  allowed  himself.  His  material,  then 
the  result  of  ten  years’  gathering,  had  been 
largely  secured  through  the  instrumentality  of 
Buckingham  Smith.  (See  Vol.  II.  p.  vii.) 

6 “ Art  of  war  and  mode  of  warfare  of  the  An- 
cient Mexicans”  ( Peabody  Mus.  Rcpt.,  no.  x.). 

“ Distribution  and  tenure  of  lands,  and  the  cus- 
toms with  respect  to  inheritance  among  the  an- 
cient Mexicans”  ( Ibid.  no.  xi.). 

“ Special  organizations  and  mode  of  govern- 
ment of  the  ancient  Mexicans”  (Ibid.  no.  xii.). 

These  papers  reveal  much  thorough  study 
of  the  earlier  writers  on  the  general  condition  of 
the  ancient  people  of  Mexico,  and  the  student 
finds  much  help  in  their  full  references.  It  was 
this  manifestation  of  his  learning  that  led  to  his 
appointment  by  the  Archaeological  Institute,  — 
the  fruit  of  his  labor  in  their  behalf  appearing 
in  his  Report  of  an  A rchceological  Tour  in  Mex- 
ico, 1881 , which  constitutes  the  second  volume 
(1884)  of  the  Papers  of  that  body.  In  his  third 
section  he  enlarges  upon  the  condition  of  Mex- 
ico at  the  time  of  the  Conquest.  His  explora- 
tions covered  the  region  from  Tampico  to  Mex- 
ico city. 

7 Library  of  Aboriginal  American  Literature, 
(Philadelphia.) 

8 James  H.  McCulloh,  an  officer  of  the  U.  S. 
army,  published  Researches  on  America  (Balt., 
1816),  expanded  later  into  Researches, philosophi- 
cal and  antiquarian,  concerning  the  original  His- 
tory of  America  (Baltimore,  1829).  His  fifth  and 
sixth  parts  concern  the  “ Institutions  of  the  Mex- 


170 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


During  the  American  Civil  War,  when  there  were  hopes  of  some  permanence  for  French 
influence  in  Mexico,  the  French  government  made  some  organized  efforts  to  further  the 
study  of  the  antiquities  of  the  country,  and  the  results  were  published  in  the  Archives 

de  la  Commission  Scientijique  du  Mex- 
ique  (Paris,  1864-69,  in  3 vols.).1  The 
Abbd  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  who  took 
a conspicuous  part  in  this  labor,  has 
probably  done  more  than  any  other 
Frenchman  to  bring  into  order  the  stu- 
dies upon  these  ancient  races,  and  in 
some  directions  he  is  our  ultimate 
source.  Unfortunately  his  character  as 
an  archaeological  expounder  did  not  im- 
prove as  he  went  on,  and  he  grew  to  be 
the  expositor  of  some  wild  notions  that 
have  proved  acceptable  to  few.  He 
tells  us  that  he  first  had  his  attention 
turned  to  American  archaeology  by  the 
report,  which  had  a short  run  in  Euro- 
pean circles,  of  the  discovery  of  a Ma- 
cedonian helmet  and  weapons  in  Brazil 
in  1832,  and  by  a review  of  Rio’s  report 
on  Palenqud,  which  he  read  in  the 
Jourtial  des  Savants.  Upon  coming 
to  America,  fresh  from  his  studies  in 
Rome,  he  was  made  professor  of  history 
in  the  seminary  at  Quebec  in  1845-46,  writing  at  that  time  a Histoire  du  Canada,  of  little 
value.  Later,  in  Boston,  he  perfected  his  English  and  read  Prescott.  Then  we  find  him 
at  Rome  poring  over  the  Codex  Vaticanus,  and  studying  the  Codex  Borgianus  in  the 
library  of  the  Propaganda.  In  1848  he  returned  to  the  United  States,  and,  embarking  at 
New  Orleans  for  Mexico,  he  found  himself  on  shipboard  in  the  company  of  the  new  French 
minister,  whom  he  accompanied,  on  landing,  to  the  city  of  Mexico,  being  made  almoner  to 
the  legation.  This  official  station  gave  him  some  advantage  in  beginning  his  researches, 
in  which  Rafael  Isidro  Gondra,  the  director  of  the  Museo,*with  the  curators  of  the  vice- 
regal archives,  and  josd  Maria  Andrade,  the  librarian  of  the  university,  assisted  him. 


BRASSEUR  DE  BOURBOURG* 


ican  Empire,”  and  “ The  nations  inhabiting  Gua- 
temala” (Field,  no.  987). 

G.  F.  Lyon’s  Journal  of  a residence  and  tour  in 
the  Republic  of  Mexico  (Lond.,  1826,  1828). 

Brantz  Mayer’s  Mexico  as  it  was  and  as  it  is, 
and  his  more  comprehensive  Mexico,  Aztec, 
Spanish  and  Republican  (Hartford,  1853),  which 
includes  an  essay  on  the  ancient  civilization. 
Mayer  had  good  opportunities  while  attached  to 
the  United  States  legation  in  Mexico,  but  of 
course  he  wrote  earlier  than  the  later  develop- 
ments (Field,  no.  1038). 

The  distinguished  English  anthropologist,  E. 
B.  Tylor’s  Anahuac  ; or,  Mexico  and  the  Mexi- 
cans, ancient  and  modern  (London,  1861),  is  a 
readable  rendering  of  the  outlines  of  the  ancient 
history,  and  he  desc’  ibes  such  of  the  archaeolog- 
ical remains  as  fell  in  his  way. 


H.  C.  R.  Becher’s  Trip  to  Mexico  (London, 
1880)  has  an  appendix  on  the  ancient  races. 

F.  A.  Ober’s  Travels  in  Mexico  (1884). 

1 The  important  papers  are:  — Tome  I.  Bras- 
seur de  Bourbourg.  Esquisses  d' histoire,  d'ar- 
cheologie,  d' ethnographic  ct  de  linguistique.  Gros. 
Renseignements  sur  les  monuments  anciens  situes 
dans  les  environs  de  Mexico.  — Tome  II.  Br.  de 
Bourbourg.  Rapport  sur  les  ruines  de  Mayapan 
ct  d' Uxtnal  au  Yucatan.  Hay.  Renseignements 
sur  Texcoco.  Dolfus,  Montserrat  et  Pavie.  Me- 
moires  et  notes  geologiqucs.  — Tome  III.  Doutre- 
laine.  Rapports  sur  les  ruines  de  Mitla,  sur  la 
pierre  de  Tlalnepantla,  stir  un  mss.  mexicain 
(avec  facsimile ).  Guillemin  Tarayre.  Rapport 
sur  P exploration  mineralogique  des  regions  mexi- 
caines.  Simeon.  Note  sur  la  numeration  des 
anciens  Mexicains. 


* Follows  an  etching  published  in  the  Annuaire  de  la  Socictc  Amcricaine  de  France,  1875.  He  died  at 
Nice,  Jan.  8,  1874,  aged  59  years. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


171 


Later  he  gave  himself  to  the  study  of  the  Nahua  tongue,  under  the  guidance  of  Faustino 
Chimalpopoca  Galicia,  a descendant  of  a brother  of  Montezuma,  then  a professor  in  the 
college  of  San  Gregorio.  In  1851  he  was  ready  to  print  at  Mexico,  in  French  and  Span- 
ish, his  Lettres  pour  servir  d’ introduction  a /’ histoire  primitive  des  anciennes  nations  civi- 
lises du  Mexique , addressed  (October,  1850)  to  the  Due  de  Valmy,  in  which  he  sketched 
the  progress  of  his  studies  up  to  that  time.  He  speaks  of  it  as  “le  premier  fruit  de  mes 
travaux  d’archdologie  et  d’histoire  mexicaines.” 1 It  was  this  brochure  which  introduced 
him  to  the  attention  of  Squier  and  Aubin,  and  from  the  latter,  during  his  residence  in 
Paris  (1851-54),  he  received  great  assistance.  Pressed  in  his  circumstances,  he  was 
obliged  at  this  time  to  eke  out  his  living  by  popular  writing,  which  helped  also  to  enable 
him  to  publish  his  successive  works.2  To  complete  his  Central  American  studies,  he 
went  again  to  America  in  1854,  and  in  Washington  he  saw  for  the  first  time  the  texts  of 
Las  Casas  and  Duran,  in  the  collection  of  Peter  Force,  who  had  got  copies  from  Madrid. 
He  has  given  us3  an  account  of  his  successful  search  for  old  manuscripts  in  Central  Amer- 
ica. Finally,  as  the  result  of  all  these  studies,  he  published  his  most  important  work, — 
Histoire  des  nations  civilisdes  du  Mexique  et  de  V Amerique  centrale  durant  les  siecles  an- 
terieurs  a C.  Colomb , ecrite  sur  des  docs,  origin,  et  entierement  inedits,  puises  aux  anciennes 
archives  des  indigenes  (Paris,  1857-58).4 *  This  was  the  first  orderly  and  extensive  effort 
to  combine  out  of  all  available  material,  native  and  Spanish,  a divisionary  and  consecutive 
history  of  ante-Columbian  times  in  these  regions,  to  which  he  added  from  the  native 
sources  a new  account  of  the  conquest  by  the  Spaniards.  His  purpose  to  separate  the 
historic  from  the  mythical  may  incite  criticism,  but  his  views  are  the  result  of  more  labor 
and  more  knowledge  than  any  one  before  him  had  brought  to  the  subject.6  In  his  later 
publications  there  is  less  reason  to  be  satisfied  with  his  results,  and  Brinton 6 even  thinks 
that  “he  had  a weakness  to  throw  designedly  considerable  obscurity  about  his  authorities 
and  the  sources  of  his  knowledge.”  His  fellow-students  almost  invariably  yield  praise  to 
his  successful  research  and  to  his  great  learning,  surpassing  perhaps  that  of  any  of  them, 
but  they  are  one  and  all  chary  of  adopting  his  later  theories.7  These  were  expressed  at 
length  in  his  Quatre  lettres  sur  le  Mexique.  Exposition  du  systbne  hieroglyphique  mexi- 
cain.  La  fin  de  I'dge  de  pierre.  llpoque  glaciaire  temporaire.  Commencement  de  rdge 
de  bronze.  Origines  de  la  civilisation  et  des  religions  de  Vantiquitd.  D'apris  le  Teo- 


1 He  says  the  work  is  very  rare.  A copy 
given  by  him  is  in  Harvard  College  library. 
Bib.  Mcx.-Guat.,  p.  26. 

2 His  Palenqud,  at  a later  day,  was  published 
by  the  French  government  ( Quatre  Lettres,  avant- 
propos). 

3 Introduction  of  his  Hist.  Nations  Civilisdes. 

4 Tome  I.  xcii.  et  440  pp.  Les  temps  hdroiques 
et  l' histoire  de  l' empire  des  Toltlques.  — Tome  II. 

616  pp.  L' histoire  du  Yucatan  et  du  Guatdmala, 
avec  celle  de  I'Anahuac  durant  le  moyen  Age  az- 
tlque,  jusqu'cl  la  fondation  de  la  royaute  A Mex- 
ico. — Tome  III.  692  pp.  L' histoire  des  Etats  du 

Michoacan  et  d’  Oaxaca  et  de  V empire  de  I'Ana- 
huac jusqii a Varrivde  des  Espagnols.  Astrono- 
mic, religion,  sciences  et  arts  des  Aztlques,  etc.  — 
Tome  IV.  vi.  et  851  pp.  Conquete  dit  Mexique, 
du  Michoacan  et  du  Guatemala,  etc.  Etablisse- 
tnent  des  Espagnols  et  fondation  de  I'Eglise  catho- 
hque.  Ruine  de  I'idolAtrie,  declin  et  abaissement 
de  la  race  indigine,  jusqu'cl  la  fin  du  xvie  siicle. 

In  his  introduction  (p.  lxxiv)  Brasseur  gives  a 
list  of  the  manuscript  and  printed  books  on 
which  he  has  mainly  depended,  the  chief  of 
which  are:  Burgoa,  Cogolludo,  Torquemada, 


Sahagun,  Remesal,  Gomara  (in  Barcia),  Loren- 
zana’s  Cortes,  Bernal  Diaz,  Vetancurt’s  Teatro 
Mexicano  (1698),  Valades’  Rhetorica  Christiana 
(rS79)»  Juarros,  Pelaez,  Leon  y Gama,  etc. 

5 Kirk’s  Prescott,  i.  10.  There  are  lists  of 
Brasseur’s  works  in  his  own  Bibliotheque  Mcx.- 
Guatbnalienne,  p.  25  ; in  the  Pinart  Catalogue,  no. 
141,  etc.;  Field,  p.  43;  Sabin,  ii.  7420.  Cf.  no- 
tices of  his  labors  by  Haven  in  Am.  Antiq.  Soc. 
Proc.,  Oct.,  1870,  p.  47  ; by  Brinton  in  Lippin- 
cott's  Mag.,  i.  79.  There  is  a Sommaire  des  voy- 
ages scientifiques  et  des  travaux  de  geographic , 
d'histoire,  d’ archeologie  et  de  Philologie  ameri- 
caines,  publics  par  Vabbe  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg 
(St.  Cloud,  1862). 

6 Abor.  Amer.  Authors,  57. 

7 Cf.  Bandelier,  Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s., 
i.  93;  Field,  no.  176;  H.  H.  Bancroft’s  Nat. 
Races,  ii.  116,  780;  v.  126,  153,  236,  241,  — who 
says  of  Brasseur  that  “ he  rejects  nothing,  and 
transforms  everything  into  historic  fact ; ” but 
Bancroft  looks  to  Brasseur  for  the  main  drift  of 
his  chapter  on  pre-Toltec  history.  Cf.  Brinton’s 
Myths  of  the  New  World,  p.  41. 


172 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


A?noxtli  [etc.]  (Paris,  1868),  wherein  he  accounted  as  mere  symbolism  what  he  had  earlier 
elucidated  as  historical  records,  and  connected  the  recital  of  the  Codex  Chimalpopoca  with 
the  story  of  Atlantis,  making  that  lost  land  the  original  seat  of  all  old-world  and  new-world 
civilization,  and  finding  in  that  sacred  history  of  Colhuacan  and  Mexico  the  secret  evi- 
dence of  a mighty  cataclysm  that  sunk  the  continent  from  Honduras  (subsequently  with 
Yucatan  elevated)  to  perhaps  the  Canaries.1  Two  years  later,  in  his  elucidation  of  the 
MS.  Troatio  (1869-70),  this  same  theory  governed  all  his  study.  Brasseur  was  quite 
aware  of  the  loss  of  estimation  which  followed  upon  his  erratic  change  of  opinion,  as  the 
introduction  to  his  Bibl.  Mex.-Guatetnalienne  shows.  No  other  French  writer,  however, 
has  so  associated  his  name  with  the  history  of  these  early  peoples.2 * 

In  Mexico  itself  the  earliest  general  narrative  was  not  cast  in  the  usual  historical  form, 
but  in  the  guise  of  a dialogue,  held  night  after  night,  between  a Spaniard  and  an  Indian, 
the  ancient  history  of  the  country  was  recounted.  The  author,  Joseph  Joaquin  Granados 
y Galvez,  published  it  in  1 778,  as  Tardes  Americanas : gobierno  getitil y catdlico  : breve y 
particular  uoticia  de  toda  la  historia  hidiana  : sucesos,  casos  notables,  y cosas  ignoradas, 
desde  la  entrada  de  la  Gran  nacion  Tulteca  & esta  tierra  de  Anahuac,  hasta  los  presentes 
tiempos? 

The  most  comprehensive  grouping  of  historical  material  is  in  the  Diccionario  Universal 
de  historia  y de  Geografia  (Mexico,  1853-56), 4 of  which  Manuel  Orozco  y Berra  was  one 
of  the  chief  collaborators.  This  last  author  has  in  two  other  works  added  very  much  to 
our  knowledge  of  the  racial  and  ancient  history  of  the  indigenous  peoples.  These  are  his 
Geografia  de  las  lenguas y Carta  Etnogrdfica  de  Mexico  (Mexico,  1864), 5 and  his  His- 
toria antigua  y de  la  Conquista  de  Mexico  (Mexico,  1880,  in  four  volumes).6  Perhaps 
the  most  important  of  all  the  Mexican  publications  is  Manuel  Larrainzar’s  Estudios  sobre 
la  historia  de  America , sus  ruinas y antigiiedades,  cotnparadas  con  lo  mds  notable  del  otro 
Continente  (Mexico,  1875-1878,  in  five  volumes). 

In  German  the  most  important  of  recent  books  is  Hermann  Strebel’s  A It-Mexico  (Ham- 
burg, 1885);  but  Waitz’s  A merikaner ( 1 864,  vol.  ii.)  has  a section  on  the  Mexicans.  Adolph 
Bastian’s  “ Zur  Geschichte  des  Alten  Mexico  ” is  contained  in  the  second  volume  of  his 
Culturlander  des  Alten  America  (Berlin,  1878),  in  which  he-considers  the  subject  of  Quet- 
zalcoatl,  the  religious  ceremonial,  administrative  and  social  life,  as  well  as  the  different 
stocks  of  the  native  tribes. 


1 Bancroft,  Nat.  Races,  v.  176;  Baldwin,  Anc. 
America. 

2 Reference  may  be  made  to  H.  T.  Moke’s 
Histoire  des peuples  Americains  (Bruxelles,  1847) ; 
Michel  Chevalier’s  “ Du  Mexique  avant  et  pen- 
dant la  Conquete,”  in  the  Revue  des  deux  Mondes, 

1845,  anfl  his  Le  Mexique  ancien  et  moderne 

(Paris,  1863);  and  some  parts  of  the  Marquis 
de  Nadaillac’s  Id  Am  erique  prbhistorique  (Paris, 

1883).  A recent  popular  summary,  without  ref- 
erences, of  the  condition  and  history  of  ancient 

Mexico,  is  Lucien  Biart’s  Les  Aztlques,  histoire, 
niceurs,  coutumes  (Paris,  1885),  of  which  there  is 
an  English  translation,  The  Aztecs,  their  his- 


tory, etc.,  translated  by  J.  L.  Gamier  (Chicago, 
1887). 

3 Leclerc,  no.  1147;  Field,  no.  620;  Squier, 
no.  427;  Sabin,  vii.  28,255;  Bandelier  in  Am. 
Antiq.  Soc.  P-  oc.,  n.  s.,  i.  116.  It  has  never  yet 
been  reprinted.  The  early  date,  as  well  as  its 
rarity,  have  contributed  to  give  it,  perhaps,  un- 
due reputation.  It  is  worth  from  £$  to  £4. 

4 Leclerc,  no.  1119.  See  Vol.  II.  p.  415. 

5 Leclerc,  no.  2079 ! Brasseur,  Bib.  Mex.-Guat., 
p.  1 13. 

6 For  the  Historia  de  Mexico  of  Carbajal  Es- 
pinosa, see  Vol.  II.  p.  428.  Cf.  Alfred  Cha- 
vero’s  Mexico  a travls  de  los  Siglos. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


173 


NOTES. 


I.  The  Authorities  on  the  so-called  Civilization  of  Ancient  Mexico  and  Adjacent  Lands, 
and  the  Interpretation  of  such  Authorities. 

The  ancient  so-called  civilization  which  the  Spaniards  found  in  Mexico  and  Central  America  is  the  subject 
of  much  controversy  : in  the  first  place  as  regards  its  origin,  whether  indigenous,  or  allied  to  and  derived  from 
the  civilizations  of  the  Old  World ; and  in  the  second  place  as  regards  its  character,  whether  it  was  something 
more  than  a kind  of  grotesque  barbarism,  or  of  a nature  that  makes  even  the  Spanish  culture,  which  supplanted 
it,  inferior  in  some  respects  by  comparison.1 2  The  first  of  these  problems,  as  regards  its  origin,  is  considered 
in  another  place.  As  respects  the  second,  or  its  character,  it  is  proposed  here  to  follow  the  history  of  opinions. 

In  a book  published  at  Seville  in  1519,  Martin  Fernandez  d’Enciso’s  Suma  de  geographia  que  tratade  todas 
las partidas  y provincias  del  tnundo : eti  especial  de  las  Indias?  the  European  reader  is  supposed  to  have 
received  the  earliest  hints  of  the  degree  of  civilization  — if  it  be  so  termed  — of  which  the  succeeding  Spanish 
writers  made  so  much.  A brief  sentence  was  thus  the  shadowy  beginning  of  the  stories  of  grandeur  and  mag- 
nificence3 which  we  find  later  in  Cortes,  Bernal  Diaz,  Las  Casas,  Torquemada,  Sahagun,  Ramusio,  Gomara, 
Oviedo,  Zurita,  Tezozomoc,  and  Ixtlilxochitl,  and  which  is  repeated  often  with  accumulating  effect  in  Acosta, 
Herrera,  Lorenzana,  Solis,  Clavigero,  and  their  successors.4 *  Bandelier  5 points  out  how  Robertson,  in  his  views 
of  Mexican  civilization  as  in  “the  infancy  of  civil  life,”  6 * really  opened  the  view  for  the  first  time  of  the  exag- 
gerated and  uncritical  estimates  of  the  older  writers,  which  Morgan  has  carried  in  our  day  to  the  highest 
pitch,  and,  as  it  would  seem,  without  sufficient  recognition  of  some  of  the  contrary  evidence. 

It  has  usually  been  held  that  the  creation  among  the  Mexicans  about  thirty  years  after  the  founding  of  Mex- 
ico of  a chief-of-men  (Tlacatecuhtli)  instituted  a feudal  monarchy.  Bandelier,'  speaking  of  the  application  of 
feudal  terms  by  the  old  writers  to  Mexican  institutions,  says : “ What  in  their  first  process  of  thinking  was 
merely  a comparative,  became  very  soon  a positive  terminology  for  the  purpose  of  describing  institutions  to 
which  this  foreign  terminology  never  was  adapted.”  He  instances  that  the  so-called  “king”  of  these  early 
writers  was  a translation  of  the  native  term,  which  in  fact  only  meant  “ one  of  those  who  spoke ; ” that  is,  a 
prominent  member  of  the  council.8  Bandelier  traces  the  beginning  of  the  feudal  ideas  as  a graft  upon  the 
native  systems,  in  the  oldest  document  issued  by  Europeans  on  Mexican  soil,  when  Cortes  (May  20,  1519)  con- 
ferred land  on  his  allies,  the  chiefs  of  Axapusco  and  Tepeyahualco,  and  for  the  first  time  made  their  offices 
hereditary.  It  is  Bandelier’s  opinion  that  “ the  grantees  had  no  conception  of  the  true  import  of  what  they 
accepted;  neither  did  Cortes  conceive  the  nature  of  their  ideas.”  This  was  followed  after  the  Spanish  occupa- 


1 Discrediting  Gomara’s  statement  that  De  Ayllon  found 
tribes  near  Cape  Hatteras  who  had  lame  deer  and  made 
cheese  from  their  milk,  Dr.  Brinton  says:  “Throughout 
the  continent  there  is  not  a single  authentic  instance  of  a 
pastoral  tribe,  not  one  of  an  animal  raised  for  its  milk,  nor 
for  the  transportation  of  persons,  and  very  few  for  their 
flesh.  It  was  essentially  a hunting  race.”  ( Myths  of  the 
New  World , 21.)  He  adds:  “The  one  mollifying  ele- 
ment was  agriculture,  substituting  a sedentary  for  a wander- 
ing life,  supplying  a fixed  dependence  for  an  uncertain  con- 
tingency.” 

2 See  Vol.  II.  p.  98. 

3 It  was  two  years  earlier,  in  1517,  that  Hernandez  de 
Cordova  had  first  noticed  the  ruins  of  the  Yucatan  coast, 
though  Columbus,  in  1502,  near  Yucatan  had  met  a Maya 
vessel,  which  with  its  navigators  had  astonished  him. 

4 “ No  writer,”  says  Bandelier  ( Peabody  Mus . Repts.  ii. 
674),  “ has  been  more  prolific  in  pictures  of  pomp,  regal 
wealth  and  magnificence,  than  Bernal  Diaz.  Most  of  the 
later  writers  have  placed  undue  reliance  on  his  statements, 
assuming  that  the  truthfulness  of  his  own  individual  feelings 

was  the  result  of  cool  observation.  Any  one  who  has  read 
attentively  his  Memoirs  will  become  convinced  that  he  is 
in  fact  one  of  the  most  unreliable  eye-witnesses,  so  far  as 
general  principles  are  concerned.  . . . Cortes  had  personal 
and  political  motives  to  magnify  and  embellish  the  picture. 

If  his  statements  fall  far  below  those  of  his  troopers  in 

thrilling  and  highly-colored  details,  there  is  every  reason  to 
believe  that  they  are  the  more  trustworthy.  ...  In  the  de- 
scriptions by  Cortes  we  find,  on  the  whole,  nothing  but  a 
barbarous  display  common  to  other  Indian  celebrations  of  a 
similar  character.” 

Bandelier’ s further  comment  is  {Ibid.  ii.  397) : “ A feudal 
empire  at  Tezcuco  was  an  invention  of  the  chroniclers,  who 


had  a direct  interest,  or  thought  to  have  one,  in  advancing 
the  claims  of  the  Tezcucan  tribe  to  an  original  supremacy.” 

Bandelier  again  {Ibid.  ii.  385)  points  out  the  early  state- 
ments of  the  conquerors,  and  of  their  annalists,  which  have 
prompted  the  inference  of  a feudal  condition  of  society ; 
but  he  refers  to  Ixtlilxochitl  as  “ the  chief  originator  of  the 
feudal  view ; ” and  from  him  Torquemada  draws  his  inspi- 
ration. Wilson  {Prehist.  Man , i.  242^  holds  much  the  same 
views. 

5  Peabody  Mus.  Tenth  Rept.  vol.  ii.  114. 

0 Bandelier  (“Art  of  War,  etc.,”  in  Peabody  Mus.  Rept. 
x.  1 13)  again  says  of  De  Pauw’s  Recherches  philo so phiques 
stir  les  A mericaines , that  it  is  “ a very  injudicious  book, 
which  by  its  extravagance  and  audacity  created  a great  deal 
of  harm.  It  permitted  Clavigero  to  attack  even  Robertson, 
because  the  latter  had  also  applied  sound  criticism  to  the 
study  of  American  aboriginal  history,  and  by  artfully  plac- 
ing both  as  upon  the  same  platform,  to  counteract  much  of 
the  good  effects  of  Robertson’s  work.” 

7 Peabody  Mus.  Repts.  ii.  114. 

8 In  regard  to  the  nature  of  the  chief-of-men  we  find, 
among  much  else  of  the  first  importance  in  the  study  of  the 
Mexican  government,  an  exposition  in  Sahagun  (lib.  vi.  cap. 
20),  which  seems  to  establish  the  elective  and  non-heredi- 
tary  character  of  the  office.  It  was  “this  office  and  its  at- 
tributes,” says  Bandelier  ( Peabody  Mus.  Repts.  ii.  670), 
“ which  have  been  the  main  stays  of  the  notion  that  a high 
degree  of  civilization  prevailed  in  aboriginal  Mexico,  in  so 
far  as  its  people  were  ruled  after  the  manner  of  eastern  des- 
potisms.” Bandelier  {Ibid.  ii.  133)  says:  u It  is  not  impos- 
sible that  the  so-called  empire  of  Mexico  may  yet  prove  to 
have  been  but  a confederacy  of  the  Nahuatlac  tribe  of  the 
valley,  with  the  Mexicans  as  military  leaders.”  His  argu- 
ment on  the  word  translated  “ king  ” is  not  convincing. 


174  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


tion  of  Mexico  by  the  institution  of  “ repartimientos,”  through  which  the  natives  became  serfs  of  the  soil  to  the 
conquerors.1 

The  story  about  this  unknown  splendor  of  a strange  civilization  fascinated  the  world  nearly  half  a century  ago 
in  the  kindly  recital  of  Prescott;2  but  it  was  observed  that  he  quoted  too  often  the  somewhat  illusory  and 
exaggerated  statements  of  Ixtlilxochitl,  and  was  not  a little  attracted  by  the  gorgeous  pictures  of  Waldeck  and 
Dupaix.  With  such  a charming  depicter,  the  barbaric  gorgeousness  of  this  ancient  empire,  as  it  became  the 
fashion  to  call  it,  gathered  a new  interest,  which  has  never  waned,  and  Morgan  3 is  probably  correct  in  affirming 
that  it  “ has  called  into  existence  a larger  number  of  works  than  were  ever  before  written  upon  any  people  of 
the  same  number  and  of  the  same  importance.”  4 5 * Even  those  who,  like  Tylor,  had  gone  to  Mexico  sceptics,  had 
been  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  Prescott’s  pictures  were  substantially  correct,  and  setting  aside  what  he  felt 
to  be  the  monstrous  exaggerations  of  Solis,  Gomara,  and  the  rest,  he  could  not  find  the  history  much  less  trust- 
worthy than  European  history  of  the  same  periods  It  has  been  told  in  another  place  ° how  the  derogatory 
view,  as  opposed  to  the  views  of  Prescott,  were  expressed  by  R.  A.  Wilson  in  his  New  Conquest  of  Mexico,  in 
assuming  that  all  the  conquerors  said  was  baseless  fabrication,  the  European  Montezuma  becoming  a petty 
Indian  chief,  and  the  great  city  of  Mexico  a collection  of  hovels  in  an  everglade,  — the  ruins  of  the  country 
being  accounted  for  by  supposing  them  the  relics  of  an  ancient  Phoenician  civilization,  which  had  been  stamped 
out  by  the  inroads  of  barbarians,  whose  equally  barbarious  descendants  the  Spaniards  were  in  turn  to  over- 
come. It  cannot  be  said  that  such  iconoclastic  opinions  obtained  any  marked  acceptance ; but  it  was  apparent 
that  the  notion  of  the  exaggeration  of  the  Spanish  accounts  was  becoming  sensibly  fixed  in  the  world's  opinion. 
We  see  this  reaction  in  a far  less  excessive  way  in  Daniel  Wilson’s  Prehistoric  Man  (i.  325,  etc.),  and  he  was 
struck,  among  other  things,  with  the  utter  obliteration  of  the  architectural  traces  of  the  conquered  race  in  the 
city  of  Mexico  itself.7  When,  in  1875,  Hubert  H.  Bancroft  published  the  second  volume  of  his  Native  Races , 
he  confessed  “ that  much  concerning  the  Aztec  civilization  had  been  greatly  exaggerated  by  the  old  Spanish 
writers,  and  for  obvious  reasons ; ” but  he  contended  that  the  stories  of  their  magnificence  must  in  the  main  be 
accepted,  because  of  the  unanimity  of  witnesses,  notwithstanding  their  copying  from  one  another,  and  because 
of  the  evidence  of  the  ruins.8 *  He  strikes  his  key-note  in  his  chapter  on  the  “ Government  of  the  Nahua  Nations,” 
in  speaking  of  it  as  “ monarchical  and  nearly  absolute ; ” 0 but  it  was  perhaps  in  his  chapter  on  the  “ Palaces 
and  Households  of  the  Nahua  Kings,”  where  he  fortifies  his  statement  by  numerous  references,  that  he  carried 
his  descriptions  to  the  extent  that  allied  his  opinions  to  those  who  most  unhesitatingly  accepted  the  old  stories.10 

The  most  serious  arraignment  of  these  long-accepted  views  was  by  Lewis  H.  Morgan,  who  speaks  of  them 
as  having  “caught  the  imagination  and  overcome  the  critical  judgment  of  Prescott,  ravaged  the  sprightly  brain 
of  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  and  carried  up  in  a whirlwind  our  author  at  the  Golden  Gate.”  11 

Morgan’s  studies  had  been  primarily  among  the  Iroquois,  and  by  analogy  he  had  applied  his  reasoning  to  the 
aboriginal  conditions  of  Mexico  and  Central  America,  thus  degrading  their  so-called  civilization  to  the  level  of 
the  Indian  tribal  organization,  as  it  was  understood  in  the  North.12  Morgan’s  confidence  in  its  deductions  was 
perfect,  and  he  was  not  very  gracious  in  alluding  to  the  views  of  his  opponents.  He  looked  upon  “ the  fabric  of 
Aztec  romance  as  the  most  deadly  encumbrance  upon  American  ethnology.”  13  The  Spanish  chroniclers,  as  he 
contended,  “inaugurated  American  aboriginal  history  upon  a misconception  of  Indian  life,  which  has  remained 


1 Peabody  Mus.  Repts.  ii.  435. 

2 Introd.  to  Conquest  of  Mexico.  §ee  Vol.  II.  p.  426. 
In  the  Appendix  to  his  third  volume,  Prescott,  relying 
mainly  on  the  works  of  Dupaix  and  Waldeck,  arrived  at 
conclusions  as  respects  the  origin  of  the  Mexican  civiliza- 
tion, and  its  analogies  with  the  Old  World,  which  accord 
with  those  of  Stephens,  whose  work  had  not  appeared  at 
the  time  when  Prescott  wrote. 

3 H buses  and  H ouse  Life , p.  222. 

4 Bancroft  (ii.  92)  says : “ What  is  known  of  the  Aztecs 
has  furnished  material  for  nine  tenths  of  all  that  has  been 
written  on  the  American  civilized  nations  in  general.” 

5 A nahuac , or  Mexico  and  the  Mexicans,  A ncient  and 
Modern  (London,  1861).  Tylor  enlarges  upon  what  he 
considers  the  evidences  of  immense  populations  ; and  re- 
specting some  of  their  arts  he  adds,  from  inspection  of  spec- 
imens of  their  handicraft,  that  “ the  Spanish  conquerors 
were  not  romancing  in  the  wonderful  stories  they  told  of 
the  skill  of  the  native  goldsmiths.”  On  the  other  hand, 
Morgan  {Houses  and  House  Life , 223)  thinks  the  figures  of 
population  grossly  exaggerated. 

8  Vol.  II.  p.  427. 

7 When  we  consider  that  Rome,  Constantinople,  and  Je- 

rusalem, in  spite  of  rapine,  siege  and  fire,  still  retain  numer- 

ous traces  of  their  earliest  times,  and  that  not  a vestige  of 

the  Aztec  capital  remains  to  us  except  its  site,  we  must 

assume,  in  Wilson’s  opinion  {Prehistoric  Man,  i.  331), 

that  its  edifices  and  causeways  must  have  been  for  the  most 

part  more  slight  and  fragile  than  the  descriptions  of  the 


conquerors  implied.  Morgan  instances  as  a proof  of  the 
flimsy  character  of  their  masonry,  that  Cortes  in  seventeen 
days  levelled  three  fourths  of  the  city  of  Mexico.  But,  adds 
Wilson,  “ so  far  as  an  indigenous  American  civilization  is 
concerned,  no  doubt  can  be  entertained,  and  there  is  little 
room  for  questioning,  that  among  races  who  had  carried  civ- 
ilization so  far,  there  existed  the  capacity  for  its  further  de- 
velopment, independently  of  all  borrowed  aid”  (p.  336). 
The  Baron  Nordenskjold  informs  me  that  there  is  in  the 
library  at  Upsala  a MS.  map  of  Mexico  by  Santa  Cruz 
(d.  1572)  which  contains  numerous  ethnographical  details, 
not  to  be  found  in  printed  maps  of  that  day. 

8 Native  Races , ii.  159. 

9 Ibid.  ii.  133. 

10  Bancroft  has  recently  epitomized  his  views  afresh  in 
the  Atner.  Antiquarian , Jan.,  1888. 

11  Bancroft  wrote  in  San  Francisco,  it  will  be  remem- 
bered 

12  It  was  for  Bandelier,  in  his  “ Social  organization  and 
mode  of  government  of  the  ancient  Mexicans”  {Peabody 
Mus.  Repts.  ii.  557),  to  demonstrate  the  proposition  that 
tribal  society  based,  according  to  Morgan,  upon  kin,  and 
not  political  society,  which  rests  upon  territory  and  prop, 
erty,  must  be  looked  for  among  the  ancient  Mexicans. 

13  Morgan’s  Houses,  etc.,  225.  Bandelier  (Peabody  Mus. 
Rept.,v ol.  ii.  114)  speaks  of  the  views  advanced  by  Morgan 
in  his  “Montezuma’s  Dinner,”  as  “a  bold  stroke  for  the 
establishment  of  American  ethnology  on  a new  basis.”  It 
must  be  remembered  that  Bandelier  was  Morgan’s  pupil. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


175 


substantially  unquestioned  till  recently.”  1 He  charges  upon  ignorance  of  the  structure  and  principles  of  Indian 
society,  the  perversion  of  all  the  writers,2  from  Cortes  to  Bancroft,  who,  as  he  says,  unable  to  comprehend  its 
peculiarities,  invoked  the  imagination  to  supply  whatever  was  necessary  to  fill  out  the  picture.3  The  actual 
condition  to  which  the  Indians  of  Spanish  America  had  reached  was,  according  to  his  schedule,  the  upper  status 
of  barbarism,  between  which  and  the  beginning  of  civilization  he  reckoned  an  entire  ethnical  period.  “ In  the 
art  of  government  they  had  not  been  able  to  rise  above  gentile  institutions  and  establish  political  society. 
This  fact,”  Morgan  continues,  “demonstrates  the  impossibility  of  privileged  classes  and  of  potentates,  under 
their  institutions,  with  power  to  enforce  the  labor  of  the  people  for  the  erection  of  palaces  for  their  use,  and 
explains  the  absence  of  such  structures.”4 5 

This  is  the  essence  of  the  variance  of  the  t\vo  schools  of  interpretation  of  the  Aztec  and  Maya  life.  The 
reader  of  Bancroft  will  find,  on  the  other  hand,  due  recognition  of  an  imperial  system,  with  its  monarch  and 
nobles  and  classes  of  slaves,  and  innumerable  palaces,  of  which  we  see  to-day  the  ruins.  The  studies  of  Ban- 
delier  are  appealed  to  by  Morgan  as  substantiating  his  view.5  Mrs.  Zelia  Nuttall  (Proc.  Am.  Assoc.  Adv.  Sci ., 
Aug.,  1886)  claims  to  be  able  to  show  that  the  true  interpretation  of  the  Borgian  and  other  codices  points  in 
part  at  least  to  details  of  a communal  life. 

The  special  issues  which  for  a test  Morgan  takes  with  Bancroft  are  in  regard  to  the  character  of  the  house 
in  which  Montezuma  lived,  and  of  the  dinner  which  is  represented  by  Bernal  Diaz  and  the  rest  as  the  daily 
banquet  of  an  imperial  potentate.  Morgan’s  criticism  is  in  his  Houses  and  House  Life  of  the  American  Abo- 
rigines (Washington,  1881).6 *  The  basis  of  this  book  had  been  intended  for  a fifth  Part  of  his  Ancieiit  Society , 
but  was  not  used  in  that  publication.  He  printed  the  material,  however,  in  papers  on  “ Montezuma’s  Din- 
ner” (No.  Am.  Rev.,  Ap.  1876),  “ Houses  of  the  Moundbuilders  ” (Ibid.,  July,  1876),  and  “ Study  of  the  Houses 
and  House  Life  of  the  Indian  Tribes”  (Archczol.  Inst,  of  Aitier.  Publ.).  These  papers  amalgamated  now 
make  the  work  called  Houses  and  House  Lifed 

Morgan  argues  that  a communal  mode  of  living  accords  with  the  usages  of  aboriginal  hospitality,  as  well  as 
with  their  tenure  of  lands.8  and  with  the  large  buildings,  which  others  call  palaces,  and  he  calls  joint  tenement 
houses.  He  instances,  as  evidence  of  the  size  of  such  houses,  that  at  Cholula  four  hundred  Spaniards  and  one 
thousand  allied  Indians  found  lodging  in  such  a house  ; and  he  points  to  Stephens’s  description  of  similar  com- 
munal establishments  which  he  found  in  our  day  near  Uxmal.9  He  holds  that  the  inference  of  communal 
living  from  such  data  as  these  is  sufficient  to  warrant  a belief  in  it,  although  none  of  the  early  Spanish  writers 
mention  such  communism  as  existing ; while  they  actually  describe  a communal  feast  in  what  is  known  as 
Montezuma’s  dinner ; 10  and  while  the  plans  of  the  large  buildings  now  seen  in  ruins  are  exactly  in  accord  with 
the  demands  of  separate  families  united  in  joint  occupancy.  In  such  groups,  he  holds,  there  is  usually  one  build- 
ing devoted  to  the  purpose  of  a Tecpan,  or  official  house  of  the  tribe.11  Under  the  pressure  to  labor,  which  the 


1 Ibid.  222. 

2 Morgan  says  of  his  predecessors,  “ they  learned  noth- 
ing and  knew  nothing”  of  Indian  society. 

3 Ibid.  223. 

4 In  this  he  of  course  assumes  that  the  ruins  in  Spanish 
America  are  of  communal  edifices. 

5 Bandelier’s  papers  are  in  the  second  volume  of  the  Re- 
ports  of  the  Peabody  Museum  at  Cambridge.  He  contends 

in  his  “ Art  of  Warfare  among  the  Ancient  Mexicans,”  that 

he  has  shown  the  non-existence  of  a military  despotism, 

and  proved  their  government  to  be  “ a military  democracy, 

originally  based  upon  communism  in  living.”  A similar 

understanding  pervades  his  other  essay  “ On  the  social  or- 
ganization and  mode  of  government  of  the  ancient  Mexi- 

cans.” Morgan  and  Bandelier  profess  great  admiration  for 
each  other,  — Morgan  citing  his  friend  as  “our  most  emi- 
nent scholar  in  Spanish  American  history  ” (Houses,  etc., 
84),  and  Bandelier  expresses  his  deep  feeling  of  gratitude, 
etc . (Archceolog.  Tour,  32).  This  affectionate  relation  has 
very  likely  done  something  in  unifying  their  intellectual 
sympathies.  The  Ancient  Society , or  researches  in  the 
li?tes  of  human  progress  from  savagery  through  barbarism 
to  civilization  (N.  Y.  1877),  of  Morgan  is  reflected  very  pal- 
pably in  these  papers  of  Bandelier.  The  accounts  of  the 
war  of  the  conquest,  as  detailed  in  Bancroft’s  Mexico  (vol. 
i. ),  and  the  views  of  their  war  customs  (Native  Races , ii. 
ch.  13),  contrasted  with  Bandelier’s  ideas, — who  finds  in 
Parkman’s  books  “the  natural  parallelism  between  the 
forays  of  the  Iroquois  and  the  so-called  conquests  of  the 
Mexican  confederacy”  (Archceol.  Tour , 32),  and  who  re- 
duces the  battle  of  Otumba  to  an  affair  like  that  of  Custer 
and  the  Sioux  (Art  of  Warfare ),  — give  us  in  the  military 
aspects  of  the  ancient  life  the  opposed  views  of  the  two 
schools  of  interpreters 


6 Being  vol.  iv.  of  the  Contributions  to  No.  A mer.  Eth - 
nol.  in  Powell’s  Survey  of  the  Rocky  Mt.  Regioti.  Some 
of  Morgan’s  cognate  studies  relating  to  the  aboriginal  sys- 
tem of  consanguinity  and  laws  of  descent  are  in  the  Smith- 
sonian Contributions , xvii.,  the  Smithsonian  Misc.  Coll. 
ii.,  A mer.  Acad.  Arts  arid  Sci.  Trans,  vii.,  and  A m. 
Assoc.  Adv.  Sci.  Proc .,  1857. 

7 Morgan  in  this,  his  last  work,  condenses  in  his  first 
chapter  those  which  were  numbered  1 to  4 in  his  Ancient 
Society , and  in  succeeding  sections  he  discusses  the  laws  of 
hospitality,  communism,  usages  of  land  and  food,  and  the 
houses  of  the  northern  tribes,  of  those  of  New  Mexico,  San 
Juan  River,  the  moundbuilders,  the  Aztecs,  and  those  in 
Yucatan  and  Central  America.  Among  these  he  finds  three 
distinct  ethnical  stages,  as  shown  in  the  northern  Indian, 
higher  in  the  sedentary  tribes  of  New  Mexico,  and  highest 
among  those  of  Mexico  and  Central  America.  S.  F.  Ha- 
ven commemorated  Morgan’s  death  in  the  A m.  Antiq.  Soc. 
Proc.,  Apr.,  1880. 

8 Cf.  Bandelier  on  “ the  tenure  of  lands  ” in  Peabody 
Mus.  Repts.  (1878),  no.  xi.,  and  Bancroft  in  Nat.  Races,  ii. 
ch.  6,  p.  223. 

9 Bandelier  ( Peabody  Mtis.  Repts.  ii.  391)  points  out  that 
when  Martin  Ursua  captured  Tayasdl  on  Lake  Petin,  the 
last  pueblo  inhabited  by  Maya  Indians,  he  found  “all  the 
inhabitants  living  brutally  together,  an  entire  relationship 
together  in  one  single  house,”  and  Bandelier  refers  further 
to  Morgan’s  A?icient  Society , Part  2,  p.  181. 

10  Bandelier  (Peabody  Mus.  Repts.  ii.  673)  accepts  the 
views  of  Morgan,  calling  it  “ a rude  clannish  feast,”  given 
by  the  official  household  of  the  tribe  as  a part  of  its  daily 
duties  and  obligations. 

11  On  the  character  of  the  Tecpan  (council  house,  or  offi- 
cial house)  of  the  Mexicans,  which  the  early  writers  traus- 


176  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Spaniards  inflicted  on  their  occupants,  these  communal  dwellers  were  driven,  to  escape  such  servitude,  into  the 
forest,  and  thus  their  houses  fell  into  decay.  Morgan’s  views  attracted  the  adhesion  of  not  a few  archeolo- 
gists, like  Bandelier  and  Dawson ; but  in  Bancroft,  as  contravening  the  spirit  of  his  Native  Races , they  begat 
feelings  that  substituted  disdain  for  convincing  arguments.!  The  less  passionate  controversialists  point  out, 
with  more  effect,  how  hazardous  it  is,  in  coming  to  conclusions  on  the  quality  of  the  Nahua,  Maya,  or  Ouiche 
conditions  of  life,  to  ignore  such  evidences  as  those  of  the  hieroglyphics,  the  calendars,  the  architecture  and 
carvings,  the  literature  and  the  industries,  as  evincing  quite  another  kind,  rather  than  degree,  erf  progress, 
from  that  of  the  northern  Indians.2 


II.  Bibliographical  Notes  upon  the  Ruins  and  Archaeological  Remains  of  Mexico  and 

Central  America. 

Elsewhere  in  this  work  some  account  is  given  of  the  comprehensive  treatment  of  American  antiquities.  It 
is  the  purpose  of  this  note  to  characterize  such  other  descriptions  as  have  been  specially  confined  to  the 
antiquities  of  Mexico,  Central  America,  and  adjacent  parts  ; together  with  noting  occasionally  those  more 
comprehensive  works  which  have  sections  on  these  regions.  The  earliest  and  most  distinguished  of  all  such 
treatises  are  the  writings  of  Alexander  von  Humboldt,3  to  whom  may  be  ascribed  the  paternity  of  what  the 
French  define  as  the  Science  of  Americanism,  which,  however,  took  more  definite  shape  and  invited  disciple- 
ship  when  the  Societe  Americaine  de  France  was  formed,  and  Aubin  in  his  Memoire  sur  la  peinture  didac- 
tiqice  et  V ecriture figurative  des  Anciens  Mexicains  furnished  a standard  of  scholarship.  How  new  this 
science  was  may  be  deduced  from  the  fact  that  Robertson,  the  most  distinguished  authority  on  early  American 
history,  who  wrote  in  English,  in  the  last  part  of  the  preceding  century,  had  ventured  to  say  that  in  all  New 
Spain  there  was  not  “ a single  monument  or  vestige  of  any  building  more  ancient  than  the  Conquest.”  After 
Humboldt,  the  most  famous  of  what  may  be  called  the  pioneers  of  this  art  were  Kingsborough,  Dupaix.  and 
Waldeck,  whose  publications  are  sufficiently  described  elsewhere.  The  most  startling  developments  came  from 
the  expeditions  of  Stephens  and  Catherwood,  the  former  mingling  both  in  his  Central  America  and  Yucatan 
the  charms  of  a personal  narrative  with  his  archaeological  studies,  while  the  draughtsman,  beside  furnishing  the 
sketches  for  Stephens’s  book,  embodied  his  drawings  on  a larger  scale  in  the  publication  which  passes  under 
his  own  name.4  The  explorations  of  Charnay  are  those  which  have  excited  the  most  interest  of  late  years, 
though  equally  significant  results  have  been  produced  by  such  special  explorers  as  Squier  in  Nicaragua,  Le 
Plongeon  in  Yucatan,  and  Bandelier  in  Mexico. 

The  labors  of  the  French  archaeologist,  which  began  in  1858,  resulted  in  the  work  Cites  et  mines  Ameri- 


late  “ palace,”  with  its  sense  of  magnificence,  see  Bande- 
lier ( Peabody  Mus.  Repts.  ii.  406,  671,  etc.),  with  his  refer- 
ences. Morgan  holds  that  Stephens  is  largely  responsible 
for  the  prevalence  of  erroneous  notions  regarding  the 
Mayas,  by  reason  of  using  the  words  “ palaces  ” and  “great 
cities  ” for  defining  what  were  really  the  pueblos  of  these 
southern  Indians.  Bancroft  (ii.  84),  referring  to  the  ruins, 
says : They  have  “ the  highest  value  as  confirming  the  truth 
of  the  reports  made  by  Spanish  writers,  very  many,  or  per- 
haps most,  of  whose  statements  respecting  the  wonderful 
phenomena  of  the  New  World,  without  this  incontroverti- 
ble material  proof,  would  find  few  believers  among  the 
skeptical  students  of  the  present  day.”  Bancroft  had  little 
prescience  respecting  what  the  communal  theorists  were 
going  to  say  of  these  ruins. 

1 Cf.  Bancroft’s  Cent . A?nerica,  i.  317.  Sir  J.  William 
Dawson,  in  his  Fossil  Men(p.  83),  contends  that  Morgan  has 
proved  his  point,  and  he  calls  the  ruins  of  Spanish  America 
“communistic  barracks ” (p.  50).  Higginson,  in  the  first 
chapter  of  his  Larger  History , which  is  a very  excellent, 
condensed  popular  statement  of  the  new  views  which  Mor- 
gan inaugurated,  says  of  him  very  truly,  that  he  lacked  mod- 
eration, and  that  there  is  “something  almost  exasperating 
in  the  positiveness  with  which  he  sometimes  assunles  as 
proved  that  which  is  only  probable.” 

2 Bancroft  in  his  footnotes  (vol.  ii.)  embodies  the  best 
bibliography  of  this  ancient  civilization.  Cf.  Wilson’s  Pre- 
historic Man , i.  ch.  14;  C.  Hermann  Berendt’s  “Centres 
of  ancient  civilization  and  their  geographical  distribution,” 
an  Address  before  the  Amer.  Geog.  Soc.  (N.  Y.  1876); 
Draper’s  Intellectual  Development  of  Europe  ; Brasseur’s 
Ms.  Troano;  Humboldt’s  Cosmos  (English  transl.  ii.  674) ; 
Michel  Chevalier  in  the  Revue  de  deux  Mondes , Mar. -July, 
1845,  embraced  later  in  his  Du  Mexique  avant  et  pendant 
la  Conqu&te  (Paris,  1845);  Brantz  Mayer’s  Mexico  as  it 
was ; The  Galaxy , March,  1876;  Scribner's  Mag.  v.  724; 


Overland  Monthly,  xiv.  468  ; De  Charency’s  Hist,  du  Ci- 
vilisation du  Mexique  {Revue  des  Questions  historiques ), 
vi.  283  ; Dabry  de  Thiersant’s  Origins  des  indiens  du  Nou- 
veau Monde  (Paris,  1883);  Peschel’s  Races  of  Men , 441; 
Nadaillac’s  Les  premiers  hommes  et  les  temps  prlhisto- 
riques,  ii.  ch.  9,  etc. 

3 For  the  bibliography  of  his  works  see  Brunet,  Sabin, 
Field,  etc.  The  octavo  edition  of  his  Vues  has  19  of  the 
69  plates  which  constitute  the  Atlas  of  the  large  edition 
See  the  chapter  on  Peru  for  further  detail. 

4 John  Lloyd  Stephens,  Incidents  of  travel  in  Central 
America , Chiapas-,  and  Yucatan , Lond.  and  N.  Y.  1841, 
— various  later  i.ds.,  that  of  London,  1854,  being  “revised 
from  the  latest  Amer.  ed.,  with  additions  by  Frederick 
Catherwood.”  Stephens  started  on  this  expedition  in 
1839,  and  he  was  armed  with  credentials  from  President 
Van  Buren.  He  travelled  3000  miles,  and  visited  eight 
ruined  cities,  as  shown  by  his  route  given  on  the  map  in 
vol.  i.  Cf.  references  in  Allibone,  ii.  p.  2240  ; Poole's  In- 
dex, p.  212;  his  Incidents  of  Travel  in  Yucatan  will  be 
mentioned  later. 

Frederick  Catherwood’s  Views  of  Ancient  Monuments 
hi  Central  America , Chiapas , and  Yucatan  (Lond.  1844) 
has  a brief  text  (pp.  24)  and  25  lithographed  plates.  Some 
of  the  original  drawings  used  in  making  these  plates  were 
included  in  the  Squier  Catalogue , p.  229.  (Sabin’s  Diet. 
iii.  no.  1 1520.)  Captain  Lindesay  Brine,  in  his  paper  on 
the  “ Ruined  Cities  of  Central  America  ” ( Journal  Roy. 
Geog.  Soc.  1872,  p.  354  ; Proc.  xvii.  67),  testifies  to  the 
accuracy  of  Stephens  and  Catherwood.  These  new  devel- 
opments furnished  the  material  for  numerous  purveyors  to 
the  popular  mind,  some  of  them  of  the  slightest  value,  like 
Asahel  Davis,  whose  Antiquities  of  Central  America , 
with  some  slight  changes  of  title,  and  with  the  parade  of 
new  editions,  were  common  enough  between  1840  and 
1850. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


177 


caines:  Mitla , Palenque , Izamal , Chichen-Itza , Uxmal , recueillies  et  photographiees  par  Desire  Char  nay , 
avec  un  Texte par  M.  Viollet  le  Due.  (Paris,  1863.)  Charnay  contributed  to  this  joint  publication,  beside 
the  photographs,  a paper  called  “ Le  .Mexique,  1858-61,  — souvenirs  et  impressions  de  Voyage.”  The  Ar- 
chitect Viollet  le  Due  gives  us  in  the  same  book  an  essay  by  an  active,  well-equipped,  and  ingenious  mind, 
but  his  speculations  about  the  origin  of  this  Southern  civilization  and  its  remains  are  rather  curious  than  con- 
vincing.1 

The  public  began  to  learn  better  what  Charnay’s  full  and  hearty  confidence  in  his  own  sweeping  assertions 
was,  when  he  again  entered  the  field  in  a series  of  papers  on  the  ruins  of  Central  America  which  he  contributed 


THE  PYRAMID  OF  CHOLULA.* 


(1879-81)  to  the  North  American  Review  (vols.  cxxxi.-cxxxiii.),  and  which  for  the  most  part  reached  the 
public  newly  dressed  in  some  of  the  papers  contributed  by  L.  P.  Gratacap  to  the  American  A?itiquarian ,2 
and  in  a paper  by  F.  A.  Ober  on  “ The  Ancient  Cities  of  America,”  in  the  Amer.  Geog.  Soc.  Bulletin , Mar., 
1888.  Charnay  took  moulds  of  various  sculptures  found  among  the  ruins,  which  were  placed  in  the  Trocadero 
Museum  in  Paris.3  What  Charnay  communicated  in  English  to  the  No.  A?ner.  Review  appeared  in  better 
shape  in  French  in  the  Tour  du  Monde  (1886-87),  and  in  a still  riper  condition  in  his  latest  work,  Les  anciens 
villes  du  Nouveau  Monde : voyages  d' explorations  au  Mexique  et  dans  V Amerique  Ce7itrale.  1837-1882. 
Ouvrage  contenant  214.  gravures  et  iq  cartes  ou plans.  (Paris,  1885.)  4 


1 Viollet  le  Due,  in  his  Histoire  de  V habitation  humaine 
depuis  les  temps  prehistoriques  (Paris,  1875),  lias  given  a 
chapter  (no.  xxii.)  to  the  “ Nahuas  and  Toltecs.”  Views 
more  or  less  studied,  comprehensive,  and  restricted  are 
given  in  R.  Cary  Long’s  A ncient  A rchitecture  of  A meric  a , 
its  historic  value  and  parallelism  of  development  with  the 
architecture  of  the  Old  World  (N.  Y.  1849),  an  address 
from  the  N.  Y.  Hist.  Soc.  Proc . 1849,  p.  117;  R.  P.  Greg 

on  “the  Fret  or  Key  Ornament  in  Mexico  and  Peru,”  in 

the  Archceologia  (London),  vol.  xlvii.  157;  and  a popular 
summary  on  “ the  pyramid  in  America,”  by  S.  D.  Peet,  in 

the  American  Antiquarian , July,  1888,  comparing  the 
mounds  of  Cholula,  Uxmal,  Palenqu£,  Teotihuacan,  Co- 
pan, Quemada,  Cohokia,  St.  Louis,  etc.  John  T.  Short 
summarizes  the  characteristics  of  the  Nahua  and  Maya 
styles  {No.  A mer.  of  Antiquity , 340,  359).  There  are  chap- 
ters on  their  architecture  in  Bancroft,  Nat.  Races , ii. ; but 
the  references  in  his  vol.  iv.  are  most  helpful. 


2 Vols.  v.  vi.  vii.  on  “Ancient  Mexican  Civilization,” 
“ Pyramid  of  Teotihuacan,”  “ Sacrificial  Calendar  Stone,” 
“ Central  America  at  time  of  Conquest,”  “ Ruins  at  Pa- 
lenque and  Copan,”  “ Ruins  of  Uxmal,”  etc. 

3 Duplicates  were  placed  in  the  Nat.  Museum  at  Wash- 
ington by  the  liberality  of  Pierre  Lorillard. 

4 The  English  translation  is  condensed  in  parts:  The 
ancient  cities  of  the  New  World : being  travels  and  ex 
p/or  at  ions  in  Mexico  a7id  Central  America  from  1857- 
1882.  Translated  from  the  French  by  f.  Gonino  arid 
Helen  S.  Conant.  (London,  1887.)  Some  of  his  notable 
results  were  the  discovery  of  stucco  ornaments  in  the  prov- 
ince of  Iturbide,  among  ruins  which  he  unfortunately 
named  Lorillard  City  (Eng.  tr.  ch.  22).  The  palace  at  Tula 
is  also  figured  in  Brocklehurst’s  Mexico  to-day , ch.  25.  The 
discovery  of  what  Charnay  calls  glass  and  porcelain  is 
looked  upon  as  doubtful  by  most  archaeologists,  who  be- 
lieve the  specimens  to  be  rather  traces  of  Spanish  contact. 


* After  a drawing  in  Cumplido’s  Spanish  translation  of  Prescott’s  Mexico , vol.  iii.  (Mexico,  1846.) 
VOL.  I.  — 12 


1 78 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


We  proceed  now  to  note  geographically  some  of  the  principal  ruins.  In  the  vicinity  of  Vera  Cruz  the  pyra- 
mid of  Papantla  is  the  conspicuous  monument,1  but  there  is  little  else  thereabouts  needing  particular  mention. 
Among  the  ruins  of  the  central  plateau  of  Mexico,  the  famous  pyramid  of  Cholula  is  best  known.  The  time 
of  its  construction  is  a matter  about  which  archaeologists  are  not  agreed,  though  it  is  perhaps  to  be  connected 
with  the  earliest  period  of  the  Nahua  power.  Duran,  on  the  other  hand,  has  told  a story  of  its  erection  by 
the  giants,  overcome  by  the  Nahuas.'2  Its  purpose  is  equally  debatable,  whether  intended  for  a memorial,  a 
refuge,  a defence,  or  a spot  of  worship  — very  likely  the  truth  may  be  divided  among  them  all.3  It  is  a similar 
problem  for  divided  opinion  whether  it  was  built  by  a great  display  of  human  energy,  in  accordance  with  the 
tradition  that  the  bricks  which  composed  its  surface  were  passed  from  hand  to  hand  by  a line  of  men,  extend- 
ing to  the  spot  where  they  were  made  leagues  away,  or  constructed  by  a slower  process  of  accretion,  spread 
over  successive  generations,  which  might  not  have  required  any  marvellous  array  of  workmen.4  The  fierce 
conflict  which  — as  some  hold  — Cortes  had  with  the  natives  around  the  mound  and  on  its  slopes  settled  its 
fate ; and  the  demolition  begun  thereupon,  and  continued  by  the  furious  desolaters  of  the  Church,  has  been 
aided  by  the  erosions  of  time  and  the  hand  of  progress,  till  the  great  monument  has  become  a ragged  and  cor- 
roded hill,  which  might  to  the  casual  observer  stand  for  the  natural  base,  given  by  the  Creator,  to  the  modern 


GREAT  MOUND  OF  CHOLULA* 


1 Bancroft,  iv.  453,  and  references. 

2 Bandelier  (p.  235)  is  confident  that  it  was  built  by  an 
earlier  people  than  the  Nahuas. 

3 Cf.  Bandelier,  p.  247.  Short,  p.  236. 

4 Bancroft  (v.  200)  gives  references  on  these  points,  and 
particular  note  may  be  taken  of  Veytia,  i.  18,  155,  199  : and 


Brasseur,  Hist.  Nations  Civ.  iv.  182.  Cf.  also  Nadaillac, 
p.  351.  Bandelier  ( A rchceolog.  Tour,  248,  249)  favors  the 
gradual  growth  theory,  and  collates  early  sources  (p.  250). 
Bancroft  (iv.  474)  holds  that  we  may  feel  very  sure  its  erec- 
tion dates  back  of  the  tenth,  and  perhaps  of  the  seventh, 
century. 


* After  a sketch  in  Bandelier’s  Archeological  Tour,  p.  233,  who  also  gives  a plan  of  the  mound.  The  modern  Church 
of  Nuestra  Sefiora  de  los  Remedios  is  on  the  summit,  where  there  are  no  traces  of  aboriginal  works.  A paved  road  leads 
to  the  top.  A suburban  road  skirts  its  base,  and  fields  of  maguey  surround  it.  The  circuit  of  the  base  is  3859  feet>  and 
the  mound  covers  nearly  twenty  acres.  Estimates  of  its  height  are  variously  given  from  165  to  208  feet,  according  as  one 
or  another  base  line  is  chosen.  It  is  built  of  adobe  brick  laid  in  clay,  and  it  has  suffered  from  erosion,  slides,  and  ot  ler 
effects  of  time.  There  are  some  traces  of  steps  up  the  side.  Bandelier  (pi.  xv.)  also  gives  a fac-simile  of  an  old  map  of 
Cholula.  The  earliest  picture  which  we  have  of  the  mound,  evidently  thought  by  the  first  Spaniards  to  be  a natural  one, 
is  in  the  arms  of  Cholula  (1540).  There  are  other  modern  cuts  in  Carbajal-Espinosa’s  Mexico  (1.  195);  Archeologia 
A mericana  (i.  12) ; Brocklehurst’s  Mexico  to-day , 182.  The  degree  of  restoration  which  draughtsmen  allow  to  themselves, 
accounts  in  large  measuie  for  the  great  diversity  of  appearance  which  the  mound  makes  in  the  different  drawings  of  it. 
There  is  a professed  restoration  by  Mother  in  Armin’s  Heutige  Mexico,  63,  68,  72.  The  engraving  n Humboldt  is 
really  a restoration  ( Vues,  etc.,  pi.  vii.,  or  pi.  viii.  of  the  folio  ed.).  Bandelier  gives  a slight  sketch  of  a restoration  (p 
246,  pi.  viii.). 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


179 


chapel  that  now  crowns  its  summit ; but  if  Bandelier’s  view  (p.  249)  is  correct,  that  none  of  the  conquerors 
mention  it,  then  the  conflict  which  is  recorded  took  place,  not  here,  but  on  the  vanished  mound  of  Quetzal- 


MEXICAN  CALENDAR  STONE.* 


* After  a cut  in  Harper's,  Magazine.  An  enlarged  engraving  of  the  central  head  is  given  on  the  title-page  of  the  pres- 
ent volume.  A photographic  reproduction,  as  the  “ Stone  of  the  Sun,”  is  given  in  Bandelier’s  A rchceological  Tour , p.  54, 
where  he  summarizes  the  history  of  it,  with  references,  including  a paper  by  Alfredo  Chavero,  in  the  Anales  del  Mziseo 
nacional  de  Mexico , and  another,  with  a cut,  by  P.  J.  J.  Valeutini,  in  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc .,  April,  1S78,  and  in 
The  Nation , Aug.  8 and  Sept.  19,  1878.  Chavero's  explanation  is  translated  in  Brocklehurst’s  Mexico  to-day , p.  186. 
The  stone  is  dated  in  a year  corresponding  to  a.  d.  1479,  and  it  was  early  described  in  Duran’s  Historia  de  las  Indias , 
and  in  Tezozomoc’s  Crdnica  mexica?ia.  Tylor  ( Anahuac , 23S)  says  that  of  the  drawings  made  before  the  days  of  pho- 
tography, that  in  Carlos  Nebel’s  Viaje  pintoresco y A rqueologico  sobre  la  Republica  Mejicana , 1829-1834  (Paris,  1839), 
is  the  best,  while  the  engravings  given  by  Humboldt  (pi.  xxiii.)  and  others  are  more  or  less  erroneous.  Cf.  other  cuts  in 
Carbajal’s  Mexico,  i.  528  ; Bustamante’s  Mananas  de  la  Alameda  (Mexico,  1835-36);  Short’s  No.  Ainer.  of  Antiq.,  408, 
451,  with  references  ; Bancroft’s  Native  Races , ii.  520  ; iv.  506  ; Stevens’s  Flint  Chips , 309. 

Various  calendar  disks  are  figured  in  Clavigero  (Casena,  1780);  a colored  calendar  on  agave  paper  is  reproduced  in  the 
Archives  de  la  Commission  Sciesitiftqiie  du  Mcxique,  iii.  120.  (Quaritch  held  the  original  document  in  Aug.,  1888,  at 
^25,  which  had  belonged  to  M.  Boban.) 

For  elucidations  of  the  Mexican  astronomical  and  calendar  system  see  Acosta,  vi.  cap.  2 ; Granados  y Galvez’s  Tardes 
Americayias  (1778) ; Humboldt’s  essay  in  connection  with  pi.  xxiii.  of  his  Atlas;  Prescott’s  Mexico,  i.  117;  Bollaert  in 
Memoirs  read  before  the  Anthropol.  Soc.  of  London,  i.  210;  E.  G.  Squier’s  Some  new  discoveries  respecting  the  dates 
07i  the  great  calesidar  sto/ie  of  the  ancient  Mexicasis,  with  observatiosis  on  the  Mexican  cycle  of  fifty-two  years , in  the 
Americast  Jour7ial of  Science  and  Arts,  2d  ser.,  March,  1849,  PP-  I53-I57  ? Abbe  J.  Pipart’s  Astro?iomie,  Chro/iologie 
et  rites  des  Mlxicabies  in  the  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer.  de  France  (n.  ser.  i.);  Brasseur’s  Nat.  Civ.,  iii.  livre  ii.  ; 
Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races , ii.  ch.  16;  Short,  ch.  9,  with  ref.,  p.  445  ; Cyrus  Thomas  in  Powell’s  Rept.  Eth}i.  Bureau , iii.  7. 
Cf.  Brinton’s  Abor.  Amer.  Authors , p.  38  ; Brasseur’s  “ Chronologie  historique  des  M^xicaines  ” in  the  Actes  de  la  Soc. 
d' Etlmographie  (1872),  vol.  vi.  ; Wilson’s  Prehistoric  Man , i.  355,  for  the  Toltecs  as  the  source  of  astronomical  ideas, 
with  which  compare  Bancroft,  v.  192;  the  Bulletm  de  la  Soc.  roy ale  Beige  de  Geog.,  Sept.,  Oct.,  1886;  and  Bandelier 
in  the  Peabody  Mus.  Repis.,  ii.  572,  for  a comparison  of  calendars. 

Wilson  in  his  Prehistoric  Ma7i  (i.  246)  says:  “ By  the  unaided  results  of  native  science,  the  dwellers  on  the  Mexican 
plateau  had  effected  an  adjustment  of  civil  to  solar  time  so  nearly  correct  that  when  the  Spaniards  landed  on  their  coast, 
their  own  reckoning,  according  to  the  unreformed  Julian  calendar,  was  really  eleven  days  in  error,  compared  with  that  of 
the  barbarian  nation  whose  civilization  they  so  speedily  effaced.” 

See  what  Wilson  ( Prehistoric  Man , i.  333)  says  of  the  native  veneration  for  this  calendar  stone,  when  it  was  exhumed. 
Mrs.  Nuttall  {Proc.  Am.  Asso.  Adv.  Sci.,  Aug.,  1886)  claims  to  be  able  to  show  that  this  monolith  is  really  a stone  which 
stood  in  the  Mexican  market-place,  and  was  used  in  regulating  the  stated  market-days. 


i8o 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


coatl,  which  in  Bandelier’s  opinion  was  a different  structure  from  this  more  famous  mound,  while  other  writers 
pronounce  it  the  shrine  itself  of  Quetzalcoatl.1 

We  have  reference  to  a Cholula  mound  in  some  of  the  earliest  writers.  Bernal  Diaz  counted  the  steps  on  its 
side.2  Motolima  saw  it  within  ten  years  of  the  Conquest,  when  it  was  overgrown  and  much  ruined.  Sahagun 
says  it  was  built  for  defensive  purposes.  Rojas,  in  his  Relation  de  Cholula , 1581,  calls  it  a fortress,  and  says  the 
Spaniards  levelled  ;ts  convex  top  to  plant  there  a cross,  where  later,  in  1594,  they  built  a chapel.  Torquemada. 
following  Motolima  and  the  later  Mendieta,  says  it  was  never  finished,  and  was  decayed  in  his  time,  though  he 
traced  the  different  levels.  Its  interest  as  a relic  thus  dates  almost  from  the  beginnings  of  the  modern  history 
of  the  region.  Boturini  mentions  its  four  terraces.  Clavigero,  in  1744,  rode  up  its  sides  on  horseback,  impelled 
by  curiosity,  and  found  it  hard  work  even  then  to  look  upon  it  as  other  than  a natural  hill.3  The  earliest  of 
the  critical  accounts  of  it,  however,  is  Humboldt’s,  made  from  examinations  in  1803,  when  much  more  than 
now  of  its  original  construction  was  observable,  and  his  account  is  the  one  from  which  most  travellers  have 
drawn,  — the  result  of  close  scrutiny  in  his  text  and  of  considerable  license  in  his  plate,  in  which  he  aimed  at 
something  like  a restoration.4  The  latest  critical  examination  is  in  Bandelier’s  “ Studies  about  Cholula  and 
its  vicinity,”  making  part  iii.  of  his  Archaological  Tour  in  Mexico  i?i  1881  £ 

What  are  called  the  finest  ruins  in  Mexico  are  those  of  Xochicalco,  seventy-five  miles  southwest  of  the  capital, 
consisting  of  a mound  of  five  terraces  supported  by  masonry,  with  a walled  area  on  the  summit.  Of  late  years 
a cornfield  surrounds  what  is  left  of  the  pyramidal  structure,  which  was  its  crowning  edifice,  and  which  up  to 
the  middle  of  the  last  century  had  five  receding  stories,  though  only  one  - now  appears.  It.  owes  its  destruction 
to  the  needs  which  the  proprietors  of  the  neighboring  sugar-works  have  had  for  its  stones.  The  earliest 
account  of  the  ruins  appeared  in  the  “ Descripcion  (1791)  de  los  antiqiiedades  de  Xochicalco”  of  Jos6  Antonio 
Alzate  y Ramirez,  in  the  Gacetas  de  Literatura  (Mexico,  1790-94,  in  3 vols. ; reprinted  Puebla,  1831,  in  4 
vols.),  accompanied  by  plates,  which  were  again  used  in  Pietro  Marquez’s  Due  Antichi  Monumenti  de  Archi * 
tettura  Messicana  (Roma,  1804), 6 with  an  Italian  version  of  Alzate,  from  which  the  French  translation  in 


1 Bandelier’s  idea  (p.  254)  is  that  as  the  Indians  never 
repair  a ruin,  they  abandoned  this  remaining  mound  after 
its  disaster,  and  transplanted  the  worship  of  Quetzalcoatl 
to  the  new  mound,  since  destroyed,  while  the  old  shrine 
was  in  time  given  to  the  new  cult  of  the  Rain-god. 

2 As  Bancroft  thinks ; but  Bandelier  says  that  it  was  not 
of  this  mound,  but  of  the  temple  which  stood  where  the 
modern  convent  stands,  that  this  count  was  made.  Arch. 
Tour , 242. 

3 St  or  ia  Ant.  del  Messico , ii.  33. 

4 Vuesy  i.  96;  pi.  iii.,  or  pi.  vii.,  viii.  in  folio  ed. ; Essai 
polity  239.  The  later  observers  are : Dupaix  ( A ntiq.  Mex.t 
and  in  Kingsborough,  v.  218;  with  iv.  pi.  viii.).  Bancroft 
remarks  on  the  totally  different  aspects  of  Castaneda’s  two 
drawings.  Nebel,  in  his  Viaje  pintoresco  y A rqueoloj ico 
sobre  la  republica  Mejicana , 1829-34  (Paris,  1839,  folio), 
gave  a description  and  a large  colored  drawing.  Of  the 
other  visitors  whose  accounts  add  something  to  our  knowl- 
edge, Bancroft  (iv.  471)  notes  the  following  : J.  R.  Poinsett, 
Notes  on  Mexico  (London,  1825).  W.  H.  Bullock,  Six 
Months  in  Mexico  (Lond.,  1825).  H.  G.  Ward,  Mexico  in 
1827  (Lond.,  1828).  Mark  Beaufoy,  Mex.  Illustrations 
(Lond.,  1828),  with  cuts.  Charles  Jos.  Latrobe,  Rambles 
in  Mexico  (Lond.,  1836).  Brantz  Mayer,  Mexico  as  it  was 
(N.  Y.,  1854) ; Mexicoy  AzteCy  etc.  (Hartford,  1S53);  and  in 
Schoolcraft,  Itid.  Tribesy  vi.  582.  Wadfly  Thompson, 


Recoil,  of  Mexico  (N.  Y.,  1847).  E.  B.  Tylor,  Anahuac 
(Lond.,  1861),  p.  274.  A.  S.  Evans,  Our  Sister  Republic 
(Hartford,  1870).  Summaries  later  than  Bancroft’s  will  be 
found  in  Short,  p.  369,  and  Nadaillac,  p.  350.  Bancroft 
adds  (iv.  471-2)  a long  list  of  second-hand  describers. 

5 It  is  illustrated  with  a map  of  the  district  of  Cholula  (p. 

155) ,  a detailed  plan  of  the  pyramid  or  mound  (Humboldt 
is  responsible  for  the  former  term)  as  it  stands  amid  roads 
and  fields  (p.  230),  and  a fac-simile  of  an  old  map  of  the 
pueblo  of  Cholula  (1581). 

Bandelier  speaks  of  the  conservative  tendencies  of  the 
native  population  of  this  region,  giving  a report  that  old 
native  idols  are  still  preserved  and  worshipped  in  caves,  to 
which  he  could  not  induce  the  Indians  to  conduct  him  (p. 

156) ;  and  that  when  he  went  to  see  the  Mapa  de  Cuauht - 
lantzincoy  or  some  native  pictures  of  the  16th  century,  rep- 
resenting the  Conquest,  and  of  the  highest  importance  for 
its  history,  he  was  jealously  allowed  but  one  glance  at 
them*  and  could  not  get  another  ( Archceol . Toury  p.  123). 
He  adds:  “The  difficulty  attending  the  consultation  of 
any  documents  in  the  hands  of  Indians  is  universal,  and 
results  from  their  superstitious  regard  for  writings  on  paper. 
The  bulk  of  the  people  watch  with  the  utmost  jealousy  over 
their  old  papers  . . . They  have  a fear  lest  the  power  vested 
in  an  original  may  be  transferred  to  a copy  ’*  (pp.  155-6). 

6 Pinart,  no.  590. 


Note.  — The  opposite  view  of  the  court  of  the  Museum  is  from  Charnay,  p.  57.  He  says:  “The  Museum  cannot  be 
called  rich,  in  so  far  that  there  is  nothing  remarkable  in  what  the  visitor  is  allowed  to  see.”  The  vases,  which  had  so 
much  deceived  Charnay,  earlier,  as  to  cause  him  to  make  casts  of  them  for  the  Paris  Museum,  he  at  a later  day  pro- 
nounced forgeries;  and  he  says  that  they,  with  many  others  which  are  seen  in  public  and  private  museums,  were  man- 
ufactured at  Tlatiloco,  a Mexican  suburb,  between  1820  and  1828.  See  Holmes  on  the  trade  in  Mexican  spurious  relics 
in  Science , 1886. 

The  reclining  statue  in  the  foreground  is  balanced  by  one  similar  to  it  at  an  opposite  part  of  the  court-yard.  One  is  the 
Chac-mool,  as  Le  Plongeon  called  it,  unearthed  by  him  at  Chichen-Itza,  and  appropriated  by  the  Mexican  government ; 
the  other  was  discovered  at  Tlaxcala. 

The  round  stone  in  the  centre  is  the  sacrificial  stone  dug  up  in  the  great  square  in  Mexico,  of  which  an  enlarged  view 
is  given  on  another  page. 

The  museum  is  described  in  Bancroft,  iv.  554  ; in  Mayer's  Mexico  as  it  wasy  etc.,  and  his  Mexico , AzteCy  etc. ; Fossey  s 
Mexique. 

On  Le  Plongeon’s  discovery  of  the  Chac-mool  see  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.y  Apr.,  1877 ; Oct.,  1878,  and  new  series,  i. 
280;  Nadaillac,  Eng.  tr.,  346;  Short,  400  ; Le  Plongeon’s  Sacred  Mysteriesy  88,  and  his  paper  in  the  Amer.  Geog.  Soc. 
Journal  ix.  142  (1877).  Hamy  calls  it  the  Toltec  god  Tlaloc,  the  rain-god  ; and  Charnay  agrees  with  him,  giving  (pp 
366-7)  cuts  of  his  and  of  the  one  found  at  Tlaxcala. 


COURT  IN  THE  MEXICO  MUSEUM. 


102 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Dupaix  was  made.  Alzate  furnished  the  basis  of  the  account  in  Humboldt’s  Vues  (i.  129;  pi.  ix.  of  folio  ed.) 
and  Waldeck  {Voyage pitt.,  69)  regrets  that  Humboldt  adopted  so  inexact  a description  as  that  of  Alzate. 
From  Nebel  (Viage pintoresco)  we  get  our  best  graphic  representations,  for  Tylor  ( Analiuac ) says  that  Cas- 
teneda’s  drawings,  accompanying  Dupaix,  are  very  incorrect.  Bancroft  says  that  one,  at  least,  of  these  draw- 
ings in  Kingsborough  bears  not  the  slightest  resemblance  to  the  one  given  in  Dupaix.  In  1835  there  were 
explorations  made  under  orders  of  the  Mexican  government,  which  were  published  in  the  Revista  Mexicana 
(i.  539,  — reprinted  in  the  Diccionario  Universal , x.  938).  Other  accounts,  more  or  less  helpful,  are  given  by 
Latrobe,  Mayer,1  and  in  Isador  Lowenstern’s  Le  Mexique  (Paris,  1843).2 

The  ancient  Anahuac  corresponds  mainly  to  the  valley  of  Mexico  city.3  Bancroft  (iv.  497)  shows  in  a 
summary  way  the  extent  of  our  knowledge  of  the  scant  archaeological  remains  within  this  central  area.4 

In  the  city  of  Mexico  not  a single  relic  of  the  architecture  of  the  earlier  peoples  remains,5  though  a few 
movable  sculptured  objects  are  preserved.6 

Tezcuco,  on  the  other  side  of  the  lake  from  Mex- 
ico, affords  some  traces  of  the  ante-Conquest  archi- 
tecture, but  has  revealed  no  such  interesting  mov- 
able relics  as  have  been  found  in  the  capital  city.7 
Twenty-five  miles  north  of  Mexico  are  the  ruins 
of  Teotihuacan,  which  have  been  abundantly  de- 
scribed by  early  writers  and  modem  explorers. 
Bancroft  (iv.  530)  makes  up  his  summary  mainly 
from  a Mexican  official  account,  Ramon  Almaraz’s 
Memoria  de  los  trabajos  ejecutados  por  la  comi * 
si  on  cientijica  de  P acinic  a (Mexico,  1865),  adding 
what  was  needed  to  fill  out  details  from  Clavigero, 
OLD  MEXICAN  BRIDGE  NEAR  TEZCUCO  * Humboldt,  and  the  later  writers.3 


1 He  repeats  Alzate’s  plate  of  the  restoration  of  the 
ruins. 

2 Bancroft  refers  (iv.  483)  to  various  compiled  accounts, 
to  which  may  be  added  his  own  and  Short’s  (p.  371).  Cf. 
F.  Boncourt  in  the  Revue  d' E thnographie  (1887). 

3 Prescott,  Kirk  ed.,  i.  12.  See  the  map  of  the  plateau 
of  Anahuac  in  Ruge,  Gesch.  des  Zeitalters  der  Entdeck., 

i.  363. 

4»  Cf.  Gros  in  the  Archives  de  la  Coni . Scient . du  Mex- 
ique, vol.  i. ; H.  de  Saussure  on  the  Decouverte  des  mines 
d'une  ancienne  ville  Mexicaine  situee  sur  le  plateau  de 
V Anahuac  (Paris,  1858,  — Bull.  Soc  Geog.  de  Paris'). 

6  The  same  is  true  of  the  earliest  Spanish  buildings. 
Icazbalceta  ( Mexico  en  1554,  p.  74)  says  that  the  soil  is 
constantly  accumulating,  and  the  whole  city  gradually 
sinks. 

6 Bancroft  (iv.  505,  516,  with  references)  says  that  such 
objects,  when  brought  to  light  by  excavations,  have  not 
always  been  removed  from  their  hiding-places ; and  he  ar- 
gues that  beneath  the  city  there  may  yet  be  “ thousands  of 
interesting  monuments.”  Cf.  B.  Mayer's  Mexico  as  it 
•was,  vol.  ii. 

Bandelier  ( Archaol . Tour , Part  ii.  p.  49)  gives  us 
valuable  “Archaeological  Notes  about  the  City  of  Mexico,” 
in  which  he  says  that  Alfredo  Chavero  owns  a very  large 
oil  painting,  said  to  have  been  executed  in  1523,  giving  a 
view  of  the  aboriginal  city  and  the  principal  events  of  the 
Conquest.  It  shows  that  the  ancient  city  was  about  one 
quarter  the  size  of  the  modern  town. 

We  find  descriptions  of  the  city  before  the  conquerors 
transformed  it,  in  Brasseur’s  Hist.  Nations  Civ.  iii.  187 ; 
iv.  line  13 ; and  in  Bancroft  (ii.  ch.  18)  there  is  a collation 
of  authorities  on  Nahua  buildings,  with  specific  references 
on  the  city  of  Mexico  (ii.  p.  567).  Bandelier  describes  with 
citations  its  military  aspects  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest 
(. Peabody  Mus.  Reports , x.  151). 

The  movable  relics  found  in  Mexico  are  the  following : — 

1.  The  calendar  stone.  See  annexed  cut. 

2.  Teoyamique.  See  cut  in  the  appendix  of  this  vol- 
ume. 


3.  Sacrificial  stone.  See  annexed  cut. 

4.  Indio  triste.  See  annexed  cut. 

5.  Head  of  a serpent,  discovered  in  1881.  Cf.  Bande- 
lier’s  ArchcBol.  Tour,  p.  69. 

6.  Human  head.  Cf.  Bancroft,  iv.  518.  All  of  the 
above,  except  the  calendar  stone,  are  in  the  Museo  Na- 
tional. 

7.  Gladiatorial  stone,  discovered  in  1792,  but  left  buried. 
Cf.  B.  Mayer’s  Mexico,  123;  Bancroft,  iv.  516;  Kings- 
borough, vii.  94;  Sahagun,  lib.  ii. 

8.  A few  other  less  important  objects.  Cf.  Bandelier, 
Arclueol.  Tour , 52. 

Antonio  de  Leon  y Gama,  who  unfortunately  had  no 
knowledge  of  the  writings  of  Sahagun,  has  discussed  most  of 
these  relics  in  his  Descripdon  historico  y Cronologico  de 
las  dos  Piedras  &*.  (2d  ed.  Bustamante,  1832.) 

7 Bancroft,  iv.  520,  with  authorities,  p.  523.  Cf.  Amer- 
ican Antiquarian , May,  1888. 

8 Bancroft’s  numerous  references  make  a foot-note  (iv. 
530).  He  adds  a plan  from  Almaraz,  and  says  that  the 
description  of  Linares  (Soc.  Mex.  Geog.  Boletin,  30,  i. 
103)  is  mainly  drawn  from  Almaraz.  It  is  believed,  but  not 
absolutely  proven,  that  the  mounds  were  natural  ones,  arti- 
ficially shaped  (Bandelier,  44).  The  extent  of  the  ruins  is 
very  great,  and  it  is  a current  belief  that  the  city  in  its 
prime  must  have  been  very  large.  The  whole  region  is  ex- 
ceptionally rich  in  fragmentary  and  small  relics,  like  pot- 
tery, obsidian  implements,  and  terra-cotta  heads.  Cf.  for 
these  last,  L ond.  Geog.  Soc.  Journal,  vii.  10;  Thompson’s 
Mexico , 140;  Nebel,  Viaje;  Mayer’s  Mexico  as  it  was, 
227  (as  cited  in  Bancroft,  iv.  542);  and  later  publications 
like  T.  U.  Brocklehurst’s  Mexico  to-day  (Lond.,  1883),  and 
Zelia  Nuttall’s  “Terra  Cotta  Heads  from  Teotihuacan,”  in 
the  Amcr.  Journal  of  Arclueology  (June  and  Sept.  1886), 
ii.  157,  318. 

Bancroft  judges  that  the  ruins  date  back  to  the  sixth  cen- 
tury, and  says  that  these  mounds  served  for  models  of  the 
Aztec  teocallis.  On  the  commission  already  referred  to 
was  Antonio  Garcfa  y Cubas,  who  conducted  some  personal 
explorations,  and  in  describing  these  in  a separate  publica- 


* After  a sketch  in  Tylor’s  Anahuac,  who  thinks  it  the  original  Puente  de  las  Bergantinas , where  Cortes  had  hi* 
brigantines  launched.  The  span  is  about  20  feet,  and  this  Tylor  thinks  “ an  immense  span  for  such  a construction.”  Cf 
H.  H.  Bancroft,  Native  Races,  iv.  479,  528.  Bandelier  ( Peabody  Mus.  Reports , ii.  696)  doubts  its  antiquity. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA.  183 


Bancroft  (iv.  ch.  10),  in  describing  what  is  known  of  the  remains  in  the  northern  parts  of  Mexico,  gives  a 
summary  of  what  has  been  written  regarding  the  most  famous  of  these  ruins,  Quemada  in  Zacatecas.1 


THE  INDIO  TRISTE* 


tion,  Ensayo  de  tin  E studio  Comfiarativo  entre  las  Pira- 
mides  Eglpciasy  Mexicanas  (Mexico,  1871),  he  points  out 
certain  analogies  of  the  American  and  Egyptian  structures, 
which  will  be  found  in  epitome  in  Bancroft  (iv.  543).  In 
discussing  the  monoliths  of  the  ruins,  Amos  W.  Butler 
( Atner . Antiquarian , May,  1885),  in  a paper  on  “ The  Sac- 
rificial Stone  of  San  Juan  Teotihuacan,”  advanced  some 
views  that  are  controverted  by  W.  H.  Holmes  in  the 
Atner . Journal  of  A rchceology  (i.  361),  from  whose  foot- 
notes a good  bibliography  of  the  subject  can  be  derived. 
Bandelier  (Archeeol.  Tour , 42)  thinks  that  because  no  spe- 
cific mention  is  made  of  them  in  Mexican  tradition,  it  is 
safe  to  infer  that  these  monuments  antedate  the  Mexicans, 
and  were  in  ruins  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest. 

1 The  early  writers  make  little  mention  of  the  place  ex- 
cept as  one  of  the  halting-places  of  the  Aztec  migration. 
Torquemada  has  something  to  say  (quoted  in  Soc.  Me x. 
Geog.  Bol .,  20,  iii.  278,  with  the  earliest  of  the  modern  ac- 


counts by  Manuel  Gutierrez,  in  1805).  Capt.  G.  F.  Lyon 
( Journal  of  aresidetice  and  tour  in  Mexico , London,  1828) 
visited  the  ruins  in  1828.  Pedro  Rivera  in  1830  described 
them  in  Marcos  de  Esparza’s  Informe  presentado  al  Go - 
biertio  (Zacatecas,  1830,  — also  in  Museo  Mexicano , i.  185, 
1843).  The  plan  in  Nebel’s  Viaje  (copied  in  Bancroft,  iv. 
582)  was  made  for  Governor  Garda,  by  Berghes,  a German 
engineer,  in  1831,  who  at  the  time  was  accompanied  by  J. 
Burkart  (A  ufentJtalt  und  Reiseti  in  Mexico , Stuttgart,  1836), 
who  gives  a plan  of  fewer  details.  Bancroft  (iv.  579)  thinks 
Nebel’s  views  of  the  ruins  the  only  ones  ever  published, 
and  he  enumerates  various  second-hand  writers  (iv.  579). 

Cf.  Fegeux,  “ Les  ruines  de  la  Quemada,”  in  the  Revue 
cT  Ethnologic,  i.  119.  The  noticeable  features  of  these  ru- 
ins are  their  massiveness  and  height  of  walls,  their  absence 
of  decoration  and  carved  idols,  and  the  lack  of  pottery  and 
the  smaller  relics.  Their  history,  notwithstanding  much 
search,  is  a blank. 


* After  a photograph  in  Bandelier’s  Archceological  Tour , p.  68.  He  thinks  it  was  intended  to  be  a bearer  of  a torch, 
and  has  no  symbolical  meaning. 


1 84  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Bancroft  (iv.  ch.  7)  has  given  a separate  chapter  to  the  antiquities  of  Oajaca  (Oaxaca)  and  Guerrero,  as  the 

most  southern  of  what  he  terms  the  Nahua  people,  including 
and  lying  westerly  of  the  Isthmus  of  Tehuantepec,  and  he 
speaks  of  it  as  a region  but  little  known  to  travellers,  except 
as  they  pass  through  a part  of  it  lying  on  the  commercial 
route  from  Acapulco  to  the  capital  city  of  Mexico.  Ban- 
croft’s summary,  with  his  references,  must  suffice  for  the  in- 
quirer for  all  except  the  principal  group  of  ruins  in  this 
region,  that  of  Mitla  (or  Lyd-Baa),  of  which  a full  recapitula- 
tion of  authorities  may  be  made,  most  of  which  are  also  to 
be  referred  to  for  the  lesser  ruins,  though,  as  Bancroft  points 
out,  the  information  respecting  Monte  Alban  and  Zachila  is 
far  from  satisfactory.  Of  Monte  Alban,  Dupaix  and  Char- 
nay  are  the  most  important  witnesses,  and  the  latter  says 
that  he  considers  Monte  Alban  “ one  of  the  most  precious 
remains,  and  very  surely  the  most  ancient  of  the  American 
civilizations.”  1 On  Dupaix  alone  we  must  depend  for  what 
we  know  of  Zachila. 

It  is,  however,  of  Mitla  (sometime  Miquitlan,  Mictlan)  that 
more  considerable  mention  must  be  made,  and  its  ruins, 
about  thirty  miles  southerly  from  Mexico,  have  been  oftenest 
visited,  as  they  deserve  to  be ; and  we  have  to  regret  that 
Stephens  never  took  them  within  the  range  of  his  observa- 
tions. Their  demolition  had  begun  during  a century  or  two 
previous  to  the  Spanish  Conquest,  and  was  not  complete 
even  then.  Nature  is  gloomy,  and  even  repulsive  in  its  des- 
olation about  the  ruins ;1  2 but  a small  village  still  exists 
among  them.  The  place  is  mentioned  by  Duran  3 as  inhab- 
ited about  1450  ; Motolinfa  describes  it  as  still  lived  in,4 *  and 
in  1565-74  it  had  a gobernador  of  its  own.  Burgoa  speaks 
of  it  in  1 644.® 

The  earliest  of  the  modern  explorers  were  Luis  Martin,  a 
Mexican  architect,  and  Colonel  de  la  Laguna,  who  examined  the  ruins  in  1802;  and  it  was  from  Martin  and  his 
drawings  that  Humboldt  drew  the  information  with  which,  in  1810,  he  first  engaged  the  attention  of  the  gen- 
eral public  upon  Mitla,  in  his  Vues  des  Cordillires.  Dupaix’s  visit  was  in  1806.  The  architect  Eduard  L. 
Miihlenpfordt,  in  his  Versuch  einer getreuen  Schilderung  der  Republik  Mejico  (Hannover,  1844,  in  2 vols.) 
says  that  he  made  plans  and  drawings  in  1830, 6 * which,  passing  into  the  hands  of  Juan  B.  Carriedo,  were  used 
by  him  to  illustrate  a paper,  “ Los  palacios  antiguos  de  Mitla,”  in  the  Ilustracion  Mexicana  (vol.  ii.),  in 
which  he  set  forth  the  condition  of  the  ruins  in  1852.  Meanwhile,  in  1837,  some  drawings  had  been  made, 
which  were  twenty  years  later  reproduced  in  the  ninth  volume  of  the  Smithsonian  Contributions  to  Knowl- 
edge, as  Brantz  Mayer’s  Observations  on  Mexican  history  and  archceology,  with  a special  notice  of  Zapolec , 
remains  as  delineated  in  Mr.  J.  G.  Sawkins's  drawings  of  Mitla , etc.  (Washington,  1857).  Bancroft  points 
out  (iv.  406)  that  the  inaccuracies  and  impossibilities  of  Sawkins’  drawings  are  such  as  to  lead  to  the  conclu- 
sion that  he  pretended  to  explorations  which  he  never  made,  and  probably  drafted  his  views  from  some  indefinite 
information  ; and  that  Mayer  was  deceived,  having  no  more  precise  statements  than  Humboldt’s  by  which  to 
test  the  drawings.  Matthieu  Fossey  visited  the  ruins  in  1838;  but  his  account  in  his  Le  Mexique  (Paris, 
1857)  is  found  by  Bancroft  to  be  mainly  a borrowed  one.  G.  F.  von  Tempsky’s  Mitla , a narrative  of  inci- 
dents and  personal  adventure  on  a journey  in  Mexico , Guatemala  and  Salvador , edited  by  J.  S. 

Bell  (London,  1858),  deceives  us  by  the  title  into  supposing  that  considerable  attention  is  given  in  the  book  to 
Mitla,  but  we  find  him  spending  but  a part  of  a day  there  in  February,  1854  (p.  250).  The  book  is  not  prized  ; 
Bandelier  calls  it  of  small  scientific  value,  and  Bancroft  says  his  plates  must  have  been  made  up  from  other 
sources  than  his  own  observations."  Charnay,  here,  as  well  as  elsewhere,  made  for  us  some  important  photo- 
graphs in  1859.8  This  kind  of  illustration  received  new  accessions  of  value  when  Emilio  Herbriiger  issued  a 


GENERAL  PLAN  OF  MITLA.* 


1 Cf.  Bandelier,  p.  320. 

2 Bandelier,  p.  276. 

3 Ramirez,  ed.  1867. 

4 His  brief  account  is  copied  by  Mendieta  and  Torque- 

mada,  and  is  cited  in  Bandelier,  p.  324. 

6  Geog.  Description,  ii.  cited  in  Bandelier,  324.  Cf.  Soc. 

Mex.  Geog.  Boletin , v’i.  170. 


6 Bandelier  says  (p.  279)  that  he  saw  them  in  the  library 
of  the  Institute  of  Oaxaca,  and  that,  though  admirable, 
they  have  a certain  tendency  to  over-restoration,  — the  be- 
setting sin  of  all  explorers  who  make  drawings. 

7 Cf.  Field,  no.  1612. 

8 Ruints,  etc.,  261,  and  Viollet  le  Due,  p.  74;  Ancient 
Villes,  ch.  24. 

Key  : A,  the  ruins  on  the  highest  ground,  with  a church 
D is  within  the  modern  village.  F is  beyond 


* After  Bandelier’s  sketch  ( Archaeological  Tour,  p.  276). 
and  curacy  built  into  the  walls.  B,  C,  E,  are  ruins  outside  the  village, 
the  river. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


185 


series  of  thirty-four  fine  plates  as  Album  de  Vistas  fotograficas  de  las  Antiguas  Ruinas  de  los palacios  de 
Mitla  (Oaxaca,  1874).  In  1864,  J.  W.  von  Muller,  in  his  Reisen  in  den  Vereinigten  Staaten , Canada  und 
Mexico  (Leipzig,  in  3 vols.),  included  an  account  of  a visit.*  The  most  careful  examination  made  since  Ban- 
croft summarized  existing  knowledge  is  that  of  Bandelier  in  his  Archceological  Tour  in  Mexico  in  iSSr 
(Boston,  1885),  published  as  no.  ii.  of  the  American  series  of  the  Papers  of  the  Archceological  Institute  of 
America , which  is  illustrated  with  heliotypes  and  sketch  plans  of  the  ruins  and  architectural  details  in  all 
their  geometrical  symmetry.  Bancroft  (iv.  392,  etc.)  could  only  give  a plan  of  the  ruins  based  on  the  sketches 
of  Miihlenpfordt  as  published  by  Carriedo,  but  the  student  will  find  a more  careful  one1  2 in  Bandelier,  who 
also  gives  detailed  ones  of  the  several  buildings  (pi.  xvii.,  xviii.) 

There  is  no  part  of  Spanish  America  richer  in  architectural  remains  than  the  northern  section  of  Yucatan, 
and  Bancroft  (iv.  ch.  5)  has  occasion  to  enumerate  and  to  describe  with  more  or  less  fullness  between  fifty  and 
sixty  independent  groups  of  ruins.3  Stephens  explored  forty-four  of  these  abandoned  towns,  and  such  was 
the  native  ignorance  that  of  only  a few  of  them  could  anything  be  learned  in  Merida.  And  yet  that  this 


SACRIFICIAL  STONE* 


1  There  is  a Rapport  sur  les  ruines , by  Doutrelaine,  in 

the  A rchivcs  de  la  Commission  Scientifique  du  Mlxique 
(vol.  iii.) ; Nadaillac  (p.  364)  and  Short  (p.  361)  have  epit- 
omized results,  and  Louis  H.  Ayme  gives  some  Notes  on 

Mitla  in  the  Amcr.  A ntiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  April,  1882,  p.  82  ; 
Bancroft  (iv.  391)  enumerates  various  second-hand  descrip- 
tions. 


2 I do  not  understand  Bandelier’s  statement  (p.  277)  that 
it  is  taken  from  Bancroft’s  plan,  which  it  only  resembles  in 
a general  way. 

3 Bancroft  classifies  their  architectural  peculiarities  (iv. 

PP.  267-279). 


* After  a photograph  in  Bandelier’s  Archaological  Tour,  p.  67.  See  on  another  page,  cut  of  the  court-yard  of  the 
Museum,  where  this  stone  is  preserved.  Cf.  Humboldt,  pi.  xxi.  ; Bandelier  in  Amer.  Antiq 1878;  Bancroft,  iv.  509; 
Stevens’s  Flint  Chips,  31 1.  There  is  a discussion  of  the  stone  in  Orozco  y Berra’s  El  Cuauhxicalli  de  Tizoc , in  the 
Anales  del  Museo  Nacional , i.  no.  1 ; ii.  no.  1.  On  the  sacrificial  stone  of  San  Juan  Teotihuacan,  see  paper  by  Amos 
W.  Butler  in  the  Amer.  Antiq.,  vii.  148.  A cut  in  Clavigero  (ii.)  shows  how  the  stone  was  used  in  sacrifices;  the  engrav- 
ing has  been  often  copied.  In  Mrs.  Nuttall’s  view  this  stone  simply  records  the  periodical  tribute  days  (Am.  Ass.  Adv. 
Sci.  Proc.%  Aug.  1886). 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


1 86 


country  was  the  land  of  a peculiar  architecture  was  known  to  the  earliest  explorers.  Francisco  Hernandez  de 
Cordova  in  1517,  Juan  de  Grijalva  in  1518,  Cortes  himself  in  1519,  and  Francisco  de  Montejoin  1527  observed 
the  ruins  in  Cozumel,  an  island  off  the  northwest  coast  of  the  peninsula,  and  at  other  points  of  the  shore. 1 It 

is  only,  however,  within  the  present  century  that 
we  have  ha  i any  critical  notices.  Rio  heard  re- 
ports of  them  merely.  Lorenzo  de  Zavala  saw 
only  Uxmal,  as  his  account  given  in  Dupaix 
shows.  The  earliest  detailed  descriptions  were 
those  of  Waldeck  in  his  Voyage p Moresque  et  ar- 
cheologique  dans  la  province  d' Yucatan  (Paris, 
1838,  folio,  with  steel  plates  and  lithographs),  hut 
he  also  saw  little  more  than  the  ruins  of  Uxmal, 
in  the  expedition  in  which  he  had  received  pecu- 
niary support  from  Lord  Kingsborough.1 2 3  It  is  to 
John  L.  Stephens  and  his  accompanying  draughts- 
man, Frederic  Catherwood,  that  we  owe  by  far  the 
most  essential  part  of  our  knowledge  of  the  Yu- 
catan remains.  He  had  begun  a survey  of  Uxmal 
in  1840,  but  had  made  little  progress  when  the  ill- 
ness of  his  artist  broke  up  his  plans.  Accordingly 
he  gave  the  world  but  partial  results  in  his  Inci- 
dents of  Travel  in  Central  America.  Not  satis- 
fied with  his  imperfect  examination,  he  returned  to 
Yucatan  in  1841,  and  in  1843  published  at  New 
York  the  book  which  has  become  the  main  source 
of  information  for  all  compilers  ever  since,  his  In- 
cidents of  Travel  in  Yucatan  (N.  Y.,  1842;  Lon- 
don, 1S43;  again,  N.  Y.,  1856,  1858).  It  was  in 
the  early  days  of  the  Daguerrean  process,  and 
Catherwood  took  with  him  a camera,  from  which 
his  excellent  drawings  derive  some  of  their  fidelity.  They  appeared  in  his  own  Views  of  Ancient  Monuments 
in  Central  America  (N.  Y.,  1844),  on  a larger  scale  than  in  Stephens’s  smaller  pages. 

Stephens’s  earlier  book  had  had  an  almost  immediate  success.  The  reviewers  were  unanimous  in  commenda- 
tion, as  they  might  well  be.8  It  has  been  asserted  that  it  was  in  order  to  avail  of  this  new  interest  that  a resi- 
dent of  New  Orleans,  Mr.  B.  M.  Norman,  hastened  to  Yucatan,  while  Stephens  was  there  a second  time,  and 
during  the  winter  of  1841-42  made  the  trip  among  the  ruins,  which  is  recorded  in  his  Rambles  in  Yucatan , or 
Notes  of  Travel  through  the  peninsula , including  a Visit  to  the  Remarkable  Ruins  of  Chi-chen , Kabah 
Zayi , and  Uxmal  (New  York,  1843).4 

The  Daguerrean  camera  was  also  used  by  the  Baron  von  Friederichsthal  in  his  studies  at  Uxmal  and 
Chichen-Itza,  and  his  exploration  seems  to  have  taken  place  between  the  two  visits  of  Stephens,  as  Bancroft 
determines  from  a letter  (April  21,  1841)  written  after  the  baron  had  started  on  his  return  voyage  to  Eutope.5 * 
In  Paris,  in  October,  1841,  under  the  introduction  of  Humboldt,  Friederichsthal  addressed  the  Academy,  and 
his  paper  was  printed  in  the  Nouvelles  Annales  des  Voyages (xcii.  297)  as  “ Les  Monuments  de  l’Yucatan.”6 
The  camera  was  not,  however,  brought  to  the  aid  of  the  student  with  the  most  satisfactory  results  till 
Charnay,  in  1858,  visited  Izamal,  Chichen-Itza,  and  Uxmal.  He  gave  a foretaste  of  his  results  in  the  Bul- 
letin de  la  Soc.  de  Geog.  (1861,  vol.  ii.  364),  and  in  1863  gave  not  very  extended  descriptions,  relying  mostly 
on  his  Atlas  of  photographs  in  his  Cites  et  Ruines  Americaines,  a part  of  which  volume  consists  of  the 
architectural  speculations  of  Viollet  le  Due.  Beside  the  farther  studies  of  Charnay  in  his  Ancietis  Villes  du 
Nouveau  Monde  (Paris,  1S85),  there  have  been  recent  explorations  in  Yucatan  by  Dr.  Augustus  Le  Plon 
geon  and  his  wife, mainly  at  Chichen-Itza,  in  which  for  awhile  he  had  the  aid  and  countenance  of  Mr.  Stephen 
Salisbury,  Jr./  of  Worcester,  Mass.  Le  Plongeon’s  results  are  decidedly  novel  and  helpful,  but  they  were 


WALDECK* 


1 See  Vol.  II.  ch.  3.  Bancroft  (ii.  p.  784)  collates  the 
early  accounts  of  the  habitations  of  the  people,  and  (iv.  254, 
260,  261)  the  descriptions  of  the  ruins  and  statelier  edifices, 
as  seen  by  these  explorers. 

2 For.  Q.  Rev.,  xviii.  251. 

3 Cf.  Poole's  Index,  p.  1439. 

1 Bancroft,  iv.  145;  Field,  no.  1138;  Leclerc,  no.  1217; 

Pilling,  p.  2767 ; Dem.  Review,  xi.  529.  Cf.  Poole's  Index, 

P-  1439- 


6 Registro  Yucateco,  ii.  437 ; Diccionario  Universal 
(Mexico,  1853),  x.  290. 

6 Bandelier,  Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc .,  n.  s.,  i.  92,  calls  the 
paper  “not  very  valuable.” 

7 This  gentleman,  since  the  death  of  his  father,  of  the 
same  name,  succeeded,  after  an  interval,  the  elder  anti- 
quary in  the  president’s  chair  of  the  American  Antiquarian 
Society. 


After  an  etching  published  in  the  Annuaire  de  la  Soc.  Amer.  de  France.  Cf.  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  October 


1875. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


187 


expressed  with  more  license  of  explication  than  satisfied  the  committee  of  that  society,  when  his  papers  were 
reierred  to  them  for  publication,  and  than  has  proved  acceptable  to  other  examiners.1  Nearly  all  other 
descriptions  of  the  Yucatan  ruins  have  been  derived  substantially  from  these  chief  authorities.2 


1 Cf.  Short,  p.  396.  Le  Plongeon  retorts  ( A mer.  A ntiq. 
Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s.,  i.  282)  by. telling  his  critic  that  he  had 
never  been  in  Yucatan.  Considering  the  effect  of  contact  in 
many  of  those  who  have  written  of  the  ruins,  it  may  be  a 
question  if  the  implication  is  valuable  as  a piece  of  criticism. 
Mr.  Salisbury  and  Dr.  Le  Plongeon  reported  from  time  to 
time  in  the  A mer.  A ntiq.  Soc.  Proc.  the  results  of  the 
latter’s  investigations,  and  the  researches  to  which  they 
gave  rise.  Those  in  April,  1876,  and  April,  1877,  of  these 
Proceedings , were  privately  printed  by  Mr.  Salisbury,  as 

The  Maycis , etc.  In  April,  1878,  Mr.  Salisbury  reported 
upon  the  “ Terra-cotta  figures  from  Isla  Mujeres.”  In  Oct., 
1878,  there  were  communications  from  Dr.  Le  Plongeon, 
and  from  Alice  D.  Le  Plongeon,  his  wife.  In  April,  1879, 
Dr.  Le  Plongeon  communicated  a letter  on  the  affinities  of 
Central  America  and  the  East.  Since  this  the  Le  Plon- 
geons  have  found  other  channels  of  communication.  Dr. 
Le  Plongeon  expanded  his  somewhat  extravagant  notions 
of  Oriental  affinities  in  his  Sacred  mysteries  among  the 
Mayas  and  the  Quiches,  rr .500  years  ago  ; their  relatio7i 
to  the  sacred  mysteries  of  Egypt,  Greece , Chaldea,  and 


Iyidia.  Freeniaso7iry  hi  times  a7itenor  to  the  temple  of 
S0I0111071  (New  York,  1886). 

His  preface  is  largely  made  up  with  a rehearsal  of  his 
rebuffs  and  in  complaints  of  the  want  of  public  apprecia- 
tion of  his  labors.  He  is,  however,  as  confident  as  ever,  and 
deciphers  the  bas-reliefs  and  mural  inscriptions  of  Chichen- 
Itza  by  “ the  ancient  hieratic  Maya  alphabet 99  which  he 
claims  to  have  discovered,  and  shows  this  alphabet  in  par- 
allel columns  with  that  of  Egypt  as  displayed  by  Cham- 
pollion  and  Bunsen.  Mrs.  Le  Plongeon  published  her 
Vestiges  of  the  Mayas  in  New  York,  in  1881,  and  gath- 
ered some  of  her  periodical  writings  in  her  Here  a7id  There 
m Yucatan  (N.  Y.,  1886).  Cf.  her  letter  on  the  ancient 
records  of  Yucatan  in  The  Natio7i,  xxix.  224. 

2 Baldwin  (p.  125),  in  a condensed  way,  and  likewise 
Short  (ch.  8)  and  Bancroft  (iv.  ch.  5),  more  at  length,  have 
mainly  depended  on  Stephens.  Cf.  references  in  Ban- 
croft, iv.  147,  and  Bandelier’s  list  in  the  Amer.  A7itiq.  Soc. 
Proc.,  n.  s.,  i.  82,  95.  E.  H.  Thompson  has  contributed  pa- 
pers in  Ibid.  Oct.,  1886,  p.  248,  and  April,  1887,  p.  379, 
and  on  the  ruins  of  Kich-Moo  and  Chun-Kal-Cin  in  April, 


* Reproduced  from  an  engraving  in  the  London  edition,  1887,  of  the  English  translation  of  his  Ancient  Cities  of  the 
New  World. 


1 88 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  principal  ruins  of  Yucatan  are  those  of  Uxmal  and  Chichen-Itza,  and  references  to  the  literature  of 
each  will  suffice.  Those  at  Uxmal  are  in  some  respects  distinct  in  character  from  the  remains  of  Honduras 
and  of  Chiapas.  There  are  no  idols  as  at  Copan.  There  are  no  extensive  stucco-work  and  no  tablets  as  at 
Palenque.  The  general  type  is  Cyclopean  masonry,  faced  with  dressed  stones.  The  Casa  de  Monjas,  or 
nunnery  (so  called),  is  often  considered  the  most  remarkable  ruin  in  Central  America  ; and  no  architectural 


FROM  CHARNAY.* 


1888,  p.  162.  Brasseur,  beside  his  Hist.  Nat.  Civ.,  ii. 
20,  has  something  in  his  introduction  to  his  Relation  de 
Landa. 

The  description  of  the  ruins  at  Zayi,  which  Stephens 
gives,  shows  that  some  of  the  rooms  were  filled  solid  with 
masonry,  and  he  leaves  it  as  an  unaccountable  fact ; but 


Morgan  ( Houses  and  House  Life , p.  267)  thinks  it  shows 
that  the  builders  constructed  a core  of  masonry,  over  which 
they  reared  the  walls  and  ceilings,  which  last,  after  harden- 
ing, were  able  to  support  themselves,  when  the  cores  were 
removed ; and  that  in  the  ruins  at  Zayi  we  see  the  cores 
unremoved. 


♦ Also  in  the  Bull.  Soc.  de  Glog.  de  Paris , 1882  (p.  542).  The  best  large  (36X28  in.)  topographical  and  historical  map 
of  Yucatan,  showing  the  site  of  ruins,  is  that  of  Huebbe  and  Azuar,  1878.  The  Pla7io  de  Yucatan , of  Santiago  Nigra  de 
San  Martin,  also  showing  the  ruins,  1848,  is  reduced  in  Stephen  Salisbury’s  Mayas  (Worcester,  1877),  or  in  the  Arner. 
Aritiq.  Soc.  Proc .,  April,  1876,  and  April,  i8*t7.  V.  A.  Malte-Brun’s  map,  likewise  marking  the  ruins,  is  in  Brasseur  de 
Bourbourg’s  Palenque  (1866).  There  are  maps  in  C.  G.  Fancourt’s  Hist.  Yucatan  (London,  1854);  Dupaix  s Atitiquitts 
Mexicaines',  Waldeck’s  Voyage  dans  la  Yucatan  (his  MS.  map  was  used  by  Malte-Brun).  Cf.  the  map  of  Yucatan  and 
Chiapas,  in  Brasseur  and  Waldeck’s  Monuments  Ancie7is  du  Mexique  (1866).  Perhaps  the  most  convenient  map  to  use 
in  the  study  of  Maya  antiquities  is  that  in  Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races,  iv.  Cf.  Crescentio  Carrillo’s  “ Geografia  Maya  ” in 
the  ATtales  del  Museo  7iacio7ial  de  Mexico , ii.  435. 

The  map  in  Stephens’s  Yucatan , vol.  i.,  shows  his  route  among  the  ruins,  but  does  not  pretend  to  be  accurate  for 
regions  off  his  course. 

The  Journal  of  the  Royal  Geog.  Soc.,  vol.  xi.,  has  a map  showing  the  ruins  in  Central  America. 

The  best  map  to  show  at  a glance  the  location  of  the  ruins  in  the  larger  field  of  Spanish  America  is  in  Bancroft’s  Nat. 
Races , iv. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


180 


feature  of  any  of  them  has  been  the  subject  of  more  inquiry  than  the  protuberant  ornaments  in  the  cornices, 
which  are  usually  called  elephants’  trunks.l  It  has  been  contended  that  the  place  was  inhabited  in  the  days 
of  Cortes.1 2 

Ihe  earliest  printed  account  of  Uxmal  is  in  Cogolludo’s  Yucathan  (Madrid,  168S),  pp.  176,  193,  197  j but 
it  was  well  into  this  century  before  others  were  written.  I.orenzo  de  Zavala  gave  but  an  outline  account  in  his 
Notice,  printed  in  Dupaix  in  1834.  Waldeck  ( Voyage  Pitt.  67,  93)  spent  eight  days  there  in  May,  1835,  and 
Stephens  gives  him  the  credit  of  being  the  earliest  describer  to  attract  attention.  Stephens  s first  visit  in  1840 
was  hasty  (Cent.  Amer.,  ii.  413),  but  on  his  second  visit  (1842)  he  took  with  him  Waldeck’s  Voyage,  and  his 


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RUINED  TEMPLE  AT  UXMAL* 


description  and  the  drawings  of  Catherwood  were  made  with  the  advantage  of  having  these  earlier  drawings 
to  compare.  Stephens  ( Yucatan , i.  297)  says  that  their  plans  and  drawings  differ  materially  from  Waldeck’s; 
but  Bancroft,  who  compares  the  two,  says  that  Stephens  exaggerated  the  differences,  which  are  not  material, 
except  in  a few  plates  (Stephens’s  Yucatan,  i.  163  ; ii.  264  — ch.  24,  25).  About  the  same  time  Norman  and 
Friederichsthal  made  their  visits.  Bancroft  (iv.  150)  refers  to  the  lesser  narratives  of  Carillo  (1845),  and 
another,  recorded  in  the  Registro  Yucateco  (i.  273,  361),  with  Carl  Bartholomaeus  Heller  (April,  1847)  in  his 
Reisen  in  Mexico  (Leipzig,  1853).  Charnay’s  Ruines  (p.  362),  and  his  Anciens  Villes  (ch.  19,  20),  record 
visits  in  1858  and  later.  Brasseur  reported  upon  Uxmal  in  1865  in  the  Archives  de  la  Com.  Scientiftque  du 
Mexique  (ii.  234,  254),  and  he  had  already  made  mention  of  them  in  his  Hist.  Nations  Civ.,  ii.  ch.  i.3 


1  Cf.  the  pros  and  cons  in  Waldeck  and  Charnay.  Wal- 
deck first  named  the  ornaments  as  “ Elephants’  trunks  ” 

(Voy.  Pitt.  p.  74).  There  are  cuts  in  Stephens,  reproduced 
in  Bancroft.  There  is  also  a cut  in  Norman.  Cf.  E.  H. 

Thompson  in  A mer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  April,  1887,  p.  382. 


2 Stephens,  Yucatan , ii.  265,  gives  an  ancient  Indian 
map  (1557),  and  extracts  from  the  archives  of  Mani,  which 
lead  him  to  infer  that  at  that  time  it  was  an  inhabited  In- 
dian town. 

3 Bancroft  (iv.  151)  gives  various  references  to  second- 


* After  a cut  in  Ruge’s  Gesch.  des  Zeitalters  der  Entdeckungen , p.  357. 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


190 


I  he  rums  of  Chichen-Itza  make  part  of  the  eastern  group  of  the  Yucatan  remains.  As  was  not  the  case 
with  some  of  the  other  principal  ruins,  the  city  in  its  prime  has  a record  in  Maya  tradition  ; it  was  known 
in  the  days  of  the  Conquest,  and  has  not  been  lost  sight  of  since, 1 though  its  ruins  were  not  visited  by  explorers 
till  well  within  the  present  century,  the  first  of  whom,  according  to  Stephens,  was  John  Burke,  in  1838. 
Stephens  had  heard  of  them  and  mentioned  them  to  Friederichsthal,  who  was  there  in  1840  ( Nouv . Annales 
des  Voyages,  x cii.  300-306).  N orman  was  there 


m February,  1842  {Rambles,  104),  and  did  not 
seem  aware  that  any  one  had  been  there  before 
him;  and  Stephens  himself,  during  the  next 
month  ( Yucatan , ii.  282),  made  the  best  record 
which  we  have.  Charnay  made  his  observa- 
tions in  1858  (Rubies,  339,  — cf.  Anciens 
Villes , ch.  18),  and  gives  us  nine  good  photo- 


FROM  CHICHEN-ITZA  * 


FROM  CHICHEN-ITZA.f 


graphs.  The  latest  discoverer  is  Le  Plongeon,  whose  investigations  were  signalized  by  the  finding  (1876)  of 
the  statue  of  Chackmool,  and  by  other  notable  researches  (Am.  Antiq . Soc.  Proc.,  April,  1877  ; October,  1878)2 
It  seems  hardly  to  admit  of  doubt  that  the  cities — if  that  be  their  proper  designation  — of  Yucatan  were 
the  work  of  the  Maya  people,  whose  descendants  were  found  by  the  Spaniards  in  possession  of  the  peninsula, 
and  ihat  in  some  cases,  like  those  of  Uxmal  and  Toloom,  their  sacred  edifices  did  not  cease  to  be  used  till 
some  time  after  the  Spaniards  had  possessed  the  country.  Such  were  the  conclusions  of  Stephens.^  the  sanest 
mind  that  has  spent  its  action  upon  these  remains  ; and  he  tells  us  that  a deed  of  the  region  where  Uxmal  is 
situated,  which  passed  in  1673,  mentions  the  daily  religious  rites  which  the  natives  were  then  celebrating  there, 
and  speaks  of  the  swinging  doors  and  cisterns  then  in  use.  The  abandonment  of  one  of  the  buildings,  at  least, 
is  brought  down  to  within  about  two  centuries,  and  comparisons  of  Catherwood’s  drawings  with  the  descrip- 
tions of  more  recent  explorers,  by  showing  a very  marked  deterioration  within  a comparatively  few  years, 
enable  us  easily  to  understand  how  the  piercing  roots  of  a rapidly  growing  vegetation  can  make  a greater  havoc 


hand  descriptions,  noted  before  1875,  to  which  may  be 
added  those  in  Short,  p.  347;  Nadaillac,  334;  Airier.  An- 
tiquarian, vii.  257,  and  again,  July,  1888. 

Probably  the  most  accurate  of  the  plans  of  the  ruins  is 
that  of  Stephens  (Yucatan,  i.  165),  which  is  followed  by 
Bancroft  (iv.  153).  Brasseur’s  report  has  a plan,  and  others, 
all  differing,  are  given  by  Waldeck  (pi.  viii.J,  Norman  (p. 
1 55),  and  Charnay  ( R nines , p.  62).  Views  and  cuts  of  de- 
tails are  found  in  Waldeck,  Stephens,  Charnay, — whence 
later  summarizes  like  Bancroft,  Baldwin,  and  Short  have 
drawn  their  copies;  while  special  cuts  are  copied  in  Armin 
(Das  Heutige  Mexico)  \ Larenaudi&re  (Mexique  et  Gua- 
temala, Paris,  1847);  Le  Plongeon  (Sacred  Mysteries ); 
Ruge  (Zeitalter  der  E ntdeckungen , p.  357);  Morgan 
( Houses , etc.,  ch.  xi.),  and  in  various  others.  One  can  best 
trace  the  varieties  and  contrasts  of  the  different  accounts 
of  the  various  edifices  in  Bancroft’s  collations  of  their 
statements.  His  constant  citation,  even  to  scorn  them,  of 
the  impertinencies  of  George  Jones's  Hist,  of  Anc.  Amer- 


ica (London,  1842), — the  later  notorious  Count  Johannes, 
— was  hardly  woi  th  while. 

1 Landa  described  the  ruins.  Relation , p.  340. 

2 All  other  accounts  are  based  on  these.  Bancroft,  who 
gives  the  best  summary  (iv.  221),  enumerates  many  of  the 
second-hand  writers,  to  whom  Short  (p.  396)  must  be  added. 
Stephens  gives  a plan  (ii.  290)  which  Bancroft  (iv.  222)  fol- 
lows ; and  it  apparently  is  worthy  of  reasonable  confidence, 
which  cannot  be  said  of  Norman’s.  The  ruins  present 
some  features  not  found  in  others,  and  the  most  interesting 
of  such  may  be  considered  the  wall  paintings,  one  repre- 
senting a boat  with  occupants,  which  Stephens  found  on 
the  walls  of  the  building  called  by  him  the  Gymnasium,  be- 
cause of  stone  rings  projecting  from  the  walls  (see  annexed 
cut),  which  were  supposed  by  him  to  have  been  used  in 
ball  games.  Norman  calls  the  same  building  the  Temple  ; 
Charnay,  the  Cirque ; but  the  native  designation  is  Iglesia. 

3 Yucatan , i.  94.  Cf.  Bancroft,  Native  Races , ii.  1 1 7 ; v. 
164,  342. 


* After  a cut  in  Squier’s  Serpent  Symbol.  There  are  two  of  these  rings  in  the  walls  of  one  of  the  buildings  twenty  or 
thirty  feet  from  the  ground.  They  are  four  feet  in  diameter.  Cf.  Stephens's  Yucatan , ii.  304;  Bancroft,  v\  230. 

t A bas-relief,  one  of  the  best  preserved  at  Chichen-Itza,  after  a sketch  in  Charnay  and  Viollet-le-Duc's  Cites  et  Ruines 
A mericaines  (Paris  1863),  p.  53,  of  which  Viollet-le-Duc  says:  “ Le  profil  du  guerrier  se  rapproche  sensiblement  les 
types  du  Nord  de  1’ Europe.” 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


191 


in  a century  than  will  occur  in  temperate  climates.  The  preservation  of  paint  on  the  walls,  and  of  wooden  lin- 
tels in  some  places,  also  induce  a belief  that  no  great  time,  such  as  would  imply  an  extinct  race  of  builders,  is 
necessary  to  account  for  the  present  condition  of  the  ruins,  and  we  must  always  remember  how  the  Spaniards 
used  them  as  quarries  for  building  their  neighboring  towns.  How  long  these  habitations  and  shrines  stood  in 
their  perfection  is  a question  about  which  archaeologists  have  had  many  and  diverse  estimates,  ranging  from 
hundreds  to  thousands  of  years.  There  is  nothing  in  the  ruins  themselves  to  settle  the  question,  beyond  a 
study  of  their  construction.  So  far  as  the  traditionary  history  of  the  Mayas  can  determine,  some  of  them  may 
have  been  built  between  the  third  and  the  tenth  century.1 


We  come  now  to  Chiapas.  The  age  of  the  ruins  of  Palenque  2 can  only  be  conjectured,  and  very  indefinitely, 
though  perhaps  there  is  not  much  risk  in  saying  that  they  represent  some  of  the  oldest  architectural  structures 
known  in  the  New  World,  and  were  very  likely  abandoned  three  or  four  centuries  before  the  coming  of  the 
Spaniards.  Still,  any  confident  statement  is  unwise.  Perhaps  there  may  be  some  fitness  in  Brasseur’s  belief 
that  the  stucco  additions  and  roofs  were  the  work  of  a later  people  than  those  who  laid  the  foundations.3  Ban- 
croft (iv.  289)  has  given  the  fullest  account  of  the  literature  describing  these  ruins.  They  seem  to  have  been 
first  found  in  1750,  or  a few  years  before.  The  report  reaching  Ramon  de  Ordonez,  then  a boy,  was  not  for- 
gotten by  him,  and  prompted  him  to  send  his  brother  in  1773  to  explore  them.  Among  the  manuscripts  in 
the  Brasseur  Collection  {Bib.  Mex.-Guat .,  p.  113;  Pinart,  no.  695)  are  a Memoria  relativa  h las  ruinas  . . . 
de  Palenque , and  Notas  de  Chiapas  y Palenque , which  are  supposed  to  be  the  record  of  this  exploration  writ- 
ten by  Ramon,  as  copied  from  the  original  in  the  Museo  Nacional,  and  which,  in  part  at  least,  constituted  the 
report  which  Ramon  made  in  1784  to  the  president  of  the  Audiencia  Real.  Ramon’s  view  was  that  he  had  hit 
upon  the  land  of  Ophir,  and  the  country  visited  by  the  Phoenicians.  This  same  president  now  directed  Jose 
Antonio  Calderon  to  visit  the  ruins,  and  we  have  his  “Informe”  translated  in  Brasseur’s  Palenque  (introd. 
p.  5).  From  February  to  June  of  1785,  Antonio  Benasconi,  the  royal  architect  of  Guatemala,  inspected  the 
ruins  under  similar  orders.  His  report,  as  well  as  the  preceding  one,  with  the  accompanying  drawings,  were 
dispatched  to  Spain,  where  J.  B.  Munoz  made  a summary  of  them  for  the  king.  I do  not  find  any  of  them 
have  been  printed.  The  result  of  the  royal  interest  in  the  matter  was,  that  Antonio  del  Rio  was  next  commis- 
sioned to  make  a more  thorough  survey,  which  he  accomplished  (May-June,  1787)  with  the  aid  of  a band  of 
natives  to  fell  the  trees  and  fire  the  rubbish.  He  broke  through  the  walls  in  a reckless  way,  that  added  greatly 
to  the  devastation  of  years.  Rio’s  report,  dated  at  Palenque  June  24,  17S7,  was  published  first  in  1855,  in  the 
Diccionario  Univ . de  Geog .,  viii.  52s.4  Meanwhile,  beside  the  copy  of  the  manuscript  sent  to  Spain,  other 
manuscripts  were  kept  in  Gua;emala  and  Mexico ; and  one  of  these  falling  into  the  hands  of  a Dr.  M’Quy,  was 
taken  to  England  and  translated  under  the  title  Deseriptioii  of  the  Ruins  of  an  Ancient  City  discovered  near 
Palenque  in  Guatemala , Spanish  America , translated  from  the  Original  MS.  Report  of  Capt.  Don  A.  Del 
Rio ; followed  by  Teatro  Critico  Americano , or  a Critical  Investigation  and  Research  into  the  History  of 
the  Americans , by  Doctor  Felix  Cabrera  (London,  1S22).5 


1 Bancroft  collates  the  views  of  different  writers  (iv.  285). 
He  himself  holds  that  these  buildings  are  more  ancient 
than  those  of  An&huac ; consequently  he  rejects  the  argu- 
ments of  Stephens,  that  it  was  by  the  Toltecs,  after  they  mi- 
grated south  from  Anahuac,  that  these  constructions  were 
raised  (. Native  Raccs}  v.  165,  and  for  references,  p.  169). 
Cham  ay  {Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Glog .,  Nov.,  1881)  believes 
they  were  erected  between  the  twelfth  and  fourteenth  cen- 
turies. 

It  is  well  known  now  that  the  concentric  rings  are  a use- 
less guide  in  tropical  regions  to  determine  the  age  of  trees, 
though  in  the  past,  the  immense  size  of  trees  as  well  as  the 
deposition  of  soil  have  been  used  to  determine  the  supposed 
ages  of  ruins.  Waldeck  counted  a ring  a year  in  getting 
two  thousand  years  for  the  time  since  the  abandonment  of 
Palenqud ; but  Charnay  (Eng.  tr.  A ncient  Cities , p.  260) 
says  that  these  rings  are  often  formed  monthly.  Cf.  Na- 
daillac,  p.  323. 

2 So  called  because  near  a modern  village  of  that  name, 
founded  by  the  Spaniards  about  1564.  Bancroft  (iv.  296) 
says  the  ruins  are  ordinarily  called  by  the  natives  Casas  de 
Piedra.  Ordonez  calls  them  Nachan,  but  without  giving 
any  authority,  and  some  adopt  the  Aztec  equivalent  Cal- 
huacan,  city  of  the  serpents.  Because  Xibalba  is  held  by 
some  to  be  the  name  of  the  great  city  of  this  region  in  the 
shadowy  days  of  Votan,  that  name  has  also  been  applied  to 
the  ruins.  Otolum,  or  the  ruined  place,  is  a common  des- 
ignation thereabouts,  but  Palenqud  is  the  appellation  in  use 
by  most  travellers  and  writers. 

3 The  fact  is,  that  widely  distinct  estimates  have  been 

held,  some  dating  them  back  into  the  remotest  antiquity, 

and  others  making  them  later  than  the  Conquest.  Bancroft 


(iv.  362)  collates  these  statements.  Cf.  Dr.  Earl  Flint  in 
Amer.  Antiqttarian , iv.  289.  Morelet  identifies  them  with 
the  Toltec  remains,  supposing  them  to  be  the  work  of  that 
people  after  their  emigration,  and  to  be  of  about  the  same 
age  as  Mitla.  Charnay  ( Anc . Cities  of  the  New  World,  p. 
260)  claims  that  Cortes  knew  the  place  as  the  religious  me- 
tropolis of  the  Acaltecs.  On  the  question  of  Cortes’  knowl- 
edge see  Science , Feb.  27,  1885,  p.  171 ; and  Ibid,  (by  Brin- 
ton)  March  27,  1885,  p.  248. 

4 The  original  is  in  the  Roy.  Acad,  of  Hist,  at  Madrid 
(Brasseur,  Bib.  Mex.-Guat .,  p.  125),  and  is  called  Descrip- 
cion  del  terreno  publacion  ajitigua. 

5 Field,  no.  231 ; Sabin,  xvii.  p.  292.  The  report  of  Rio 
was  brief,  and  as  we  would  judge  now,  superficial.  Dupaix 
treats  him  disparagingly.  The  appended  essay  by  Cabrera, 
an  Italian,  is  said  to  have  been  largely  filched  from  Ramon’s 
paper,  which  had  been  confidentially  placed  in  his  hands 
(Short,  207).  A Spanish  text  of  Cabrera  is  in  the  Museo 
Nacional.  Cf.  Brasseur  {Bib.  Mex.-Guat .),  p.  30;  Pinart, 
no.  186.  It  is  a question  if  the  plates,  which  constituted  the 
most  interesting  part  of  the  English  book,  be  Rio’s  after 
all ; for  though  they  profess  to  be  engraved  after  his  draw- 
ings, they  are  suspiciously  like  those  made  by  Castaneda, 
twenty  years  after  Rio’s  visit  (Bancroft,  iv.  290).  David 
B.  Warden  translated  Rio’s  report  in  the  Reaieil  de  voy- 
ages et  de  Memoires,  par  la  Soc.  de  la  Geog.  de  Paris 
(vol.  ii.),  and  gave  some  of  the  plates.  (Cf.  Warden’s  Re- 
cherches  sur  les  antiquites  de  I A nieriq7(e  Septentrio?iale , 
Paris,  1827,  in  Mem.  de  la  Soc.  de  Geog.)  There  is  a Ger- 
man version,  Beschreibung  einer  alten  Siadt  (Berlin,  1832), 
by  J.  H.  von  Minutoli,  which  is  provided  with  an  intro- 
ductory essay. 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


192 

The  results  of  the  explorations  of  Dupaix,  made  early  in  the  present  century  by  order  of  Carlos  IV.  of  Spain 
long  remained  unpublished.  His  report  and  the  drawings  of  Castaneda  lay  uncared  for  in  the  Mexican  ar- 
chives during  the  period  of  the  Revolution.  Latour  Allard,  of  Paris,  obtained  copies  of  some  of  the  drawings, 
and  from  these  Kingsborough  got  copies,  which  he  engraved  for  his  Mexican  Antiquities , in  which  Dupaix’s 
report  was  also  printed  in  Spanish  and  English  (vols.  iv.,  v.,  vi.).  It  is  not  quite  certain  whether  the  originals 
or  copies  were  delivered  (1828)  by  the  Mexican  authorities  to  Baradere,  who  a few  years  later  secured  then- 
publication  with  additional  matter  as  Antiquitcs  mexicaines.  Relation  des  trois  expeditions  du  capitaine 


A RESTORATION  BY  VIOLLET-LE-DUC.* 


Dupaix , ordonnees  en  1 80s , iSob  et  1&07,  pour  la  recherche  des  antiquites  du  pays , notamment  cedes  de 
Mitla  et  de  Palenque  ; accompagnee  des  dessins  de  Castaneda , et  d'une  carte  du  pays  explore  ; suivie  d'un 
parallilc  de  ces  monuments  avec  ceux  de  V ligypte,  de  l' Indostan,  et  du  reste  de  Vancien  monde  par  Alex- 
andre Lenoir ; d’une  dissertation  sur  I’origine  de  Vancicnne  population  des  deux  Ameriques  par  [D.  B.] 
Warden  ; avec  un  discours  preliminaire  par  M.  Charles  Farcy,  et  des  notes  explicatives,  et  autres  docu- 
ments par  MM.  Baradere,  de  St.  Priest  [etc.].  (Paris:  1834,  texte  et  atlas.)1  The  plates  of  this  edition 

1 Sabin,  x.  209,  213.  Cf.  Annates  de  Philos.  Chrltienne,  xi. 

* From  Histoire  de  V Habitation  Humaine,  par  Viollet-le-Duc  (Paris,  1875).  There  is  a restoration  of  the  Palenque 
palace  — so  called  — in  Armin’s  Das  heutige  Mexico  (copied  in  Short,  342,  and  Bancroft,  iv.  323). 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


193 


are  superior  to  those  in  Kingsborough  and  in  Rio  ; and  are  indeed  improved  in  the  engraving  over  Castaneda’s 
drawings.  The’book  as  a whole  is  one  of  the  most  important  on  Paienque  which  we  have.  The  investiga- 
tions were  made  on  his  third  expedition  (1807-8).  A tablet  taken  from  the  ruins  by  him  is  in  the  Museo 
Nacional,  and  a cast  of  it  is  figured  in  the  Numis.  and  Antiq.  Soc.  of  Philad.  Proc.,  Dec.  4,  18S4. 

During  the  twenty-five  years  next  following  Dupaix,  we  find  two  correspondents  of  the  French  and  English 
Geographical  Societies  supplying  their  publications  with  occasional  accounts  of  their  observations  among  the 
ruins.  One  of  them,  Dr.  F.  Corroy,1  was  then  living  at  Tabasco ; the  other,  Col.  Juan  Gallindo,2  was  resident 
in  the  country  as  an  administrative  officer. 


SCULPTURES,  TEMPLE  OF  THE  CROSS,  PALENQUE.* 

1 Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Gcog.  de  Paris , ix.  (1828)  198.  Du-  no.  769,  and  in  Lotid.  Geog.  Soc.  Journal , iii.  60).  Cf. 

paix,  i.  2d  div.  76.  Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Geog.  de  Paris , 1832.  He  is  over- 

2 “ Paienque  et  autres  lieux  circonvoisins,”  in  Dupaix,  i.  enthusiastic,  as  Bandelier  thinks  ( Ainer . Ant.  Soc.  Proc., 
2d  div.  67  (in  English  in  Literary  Gazette , London,  1831,  n.  s.,  i.  p.  hi). 

* These  slabs,  six  feet  high,  were  taken  from  Palenqud,  and  when  Stephens  saw  them  they  were  in  private  hands  at 
San  Domingo,  near  by,  but  later  they  were  placecTin  the  church  front  in  the  same  town,  and  here  Charnay  took  impres- 
sions of  them,  from  which  they  were  engraved  in  The  A7icic7it  Cities , etc.,  p.  217,  and  copied  thence  in  the  above  cuts. 
This  same  type  of  head  is  considered  by  Rosny  the  Aztec  head  of  Paienque  {Doc.  ter  its  de  la  A7itiq.  A mer .,  73),  and  as 
belonging  to  the  superior  classes.  In  order  to  secure  the  convex  curve  of  the  nose  and  forehead  an  ornament  was  some- 
times added,  as  shown  in  a head  of  the  second  tablet  at  Paienque,  and  in  the  photograph  of  a bas-relief,  preserved  in  the 
Museo  Archeogico  at  Madrid,  given  by  Rosny  (vol.  3),  and  hypothetically  called  by  him  a statue  of  Cuculkan.  This 
ornament  is  not  infrequently  seen  in  other  images  of  this  region. 

Bandelier  {Peabody  Mus.  Repts .,  ii.  126),  speaking  of  the  tablet  of  the  Cross  of  Palenqu^,  says:  “These  tablets  and 
figures  show  in  dress  such  a striking  analogy  of  what  we  know  of  the  military  accoutrements  of  the  Mexicans,  that  it  is  a 
strong  approach  to  identity.” 

VOL.  I. — [3 


194 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


Frederic  de  Waldeck,  the  artist  who  some  years  before  had  familiarized  himself  with  the  character  of  the 
ruins  in  the  preparation  of  the  engravings  for  Rio’s  work,  was  employed  in  1832-34.  He  was  now  consid- 
erably over  sixty  years  of  age,  and  under  the  pay  of  a committee,  which  had  raised  a subscription,  in  which  the 
Mexican  government  shared.  He  made  the  most  thorough  examination  of  Palenque  which  has  yet  been  made. 
Waldeck  was  a skilful  artist,  and  his  drawings  are  exquisite ; but  he  was  not  free  from  a tendency  to  improve 
or  restore,  where  the  conditions  gave  a hint,  and  so  as  we  have  them  in  the  final  publication  they  have  not  been 
accepted  as  wholly  trustworthy.  He  made  more  than  200  drawings,  and  either  the  originals  or  copies  — 
Stephens  says  “copies,”  the  originals  being  confiscated — were  taken  to  Europe.  Waldeck  announced  his 
book  in  Paris,  and  the  public  had  already  had  a taste  of  his  not  very  sober  views  in  some  communications 
which  he  had  sent  in  Aug.  and  Nov.,  1832,  to  the  Societe  de  Geographie  de  Paris.  Long  years  of  delay  fol- 
lowed, and  Waldeck  had  lived  to  be  over  ninety,  when  the  French  government  bought  his  collection 1 (in  i860), 
and  made  preparations  for  its  publication.  Out  of  the  188  drawings  thus  secured,  56  were  selected  and  were 


PLAN  OF  COPAN  (RUINS  AND  VILLAGE).* 


admirably  engraved,  and  only  that  portion  of  Waldeck’s  text  was  preserved  which  was  purely  descriptive, 
and  not  all  of  that.  Selection  was  made  of  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  who  at  that  time  had  never  visited  the 
ruins,2  to  furnish  some  introductory  matter.  This  he  prepared  in  an  Avant-propos,  recapitulating  the  progress 
of  such  studies ; and  this  was  followed  by  an  Introduction  aux  Ruines  de  P alenque,  narrating  the  course  of 
explorations  up  to  that  time  ; a section  also  published  separately  as  Recherches  stir  les  Ruines  de  Palenque 
et  sur  les  origines  de  la  civilisation  du  Mexique  (Paris,  1886),  and  finally  Waldeck’s  own  Description  des 
Ruines , followed  by  the  plates,  most  of  which  relate  to  Palenque.  Thus  composed,  a large  volume  was  pub- 
lished under  the  general  title  of  Monuments  anciens  du  Mexique.  Palenque  et  autres  ruines  de  V ancienne 
civilisation  du  Mexique.  Collection  de  vues  [etc.],  cartes  et  plans  dessincs  d'apr es  nature  et  rcleves  pai  M. 
de  Waldeck.  Texte  redige  par  M.  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg.  (Paris,  1864— 1866.)  8 While  Waldeck’s  results 
were  still  unpublished  the  ruins  of  Palenqu6  were  brought  most  effectively  to  the  attention  of  the  English 
reader  in  the  Travels  in  Central  America  (vol.  ii.  ch.  17)  of  Stephens,  which  was  illustrated  by  the  drawings 
of  Catherwood,4  since  famous.  These  better  cover  the  field,  and  are  more  exact  than  those  of  Dupaix. 

Bancroft  refers  to  an  anonymous  account  in  the  Registro  Yucateco  (i.  318).  One  of  the  most  intelligent  of 
the  later  travellers  is  Arthur  Morelet,  who  privately  printed  his  Voyage  dans  V Amerique  Central , Cuba  et  le 
Yucatan , which  includes  an  account  of  a fortnight’s  stay  at  Palenqufi.  His  results  would  be  difficult  of  access 

1 The  report  by  Angrand,  which  induced  this  purchase,  3 The  book  usually  sells  for  about  150  francs. 

is  in  the  work  as  nublished.  4 Given,  also  enlarged,  in  the  folio  known  as  Cather 

2 He  had  described  them  in  his  Hist.  Nat.  Civ.,  i.  ch.  3.  wood’s  Views. 

* From  The  Stone  Sculptures  of  Copan  and  Quingua  (N.  Y.,  1883)  of  Meye  and  Schmidt. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


195 


except  that  Mrs.  M.  F.  Squier,  with  an  introduction  by  E.  G.  Squier,  published  a translation  of  that  part  of  it 
relating  to  the  main  land  as  Travels  in  Central  America , including  accounts  of  regions  unexplored  since  the 
Conquest  (N.  Y.,  1871 )A 

Desire  Charnay  was  the  first  to  bring  photography  to  the  aid  of  the  student  when  he  visited  Palenque  in 
1858,  and  his  plates  forming  the  folio  atlas  accompanying  his  Cites  et  Ruines  Americaines  (1863),  PP*  72>  4IT> 
are,  as  Bancroft  (iv.  293)  points  out,  of  interest  to  enable  us  to  test  the  drawings  of  preceding  delineators,  and 
to  show  how  time  had  acted  on  the  ruins  since  the  visit  of  Stephens.  His  later  results  are  recorded  in  his 
Les  anciennes  villes  du  Nouveau  Monde  (Paris,  1885).2 


YUCATAN  TYPES* 


1 The  German  version  was  made  from  this  (Jena,  1872). 

2 Particularly  ch.  13,  x 4.  Charnay  is  the  last  of  the  ex- 
plorers of  Palenqu^.  All  the  other  accounts  of  the  ruins 
found  here  and  there  are  based  on  the  descriptions  of 
those  who  have  been  named,  or  at  least  nothing  is  added 
of  material  value  by  other  actual  visitors  like  Norman 
(. Rambles  in  Yucatan , p.  284).  Bancroft  (iv.  294)  enumer- 
ates a number  of  such  second-hand  describers.  The  most 
important  work  since  Bancroft’s  summary  is  Manuel  Lar- 
rainzar’s  E studios  sobre  la  historia  de  A meric  a,  sus  ruinas 
y antiguedades , y sobre  el origen  de  sus  habitantes  (Mexico, 
*875— 78),  in  five  vols.,  all  of  whose  plates  are  illustrations 
from  the  ruins  of  Palenque,  which  are  described  and  com- 
pared with  other  ancient  remains  throughout  the  world. 
Cf.  Briihl,  Culturvolker  d.  alt.  Amerikas.  Plans  of  the 
ruins  will  be  found  in  Waldeckfpl.  vii.,  followed  mainly 
by  Bancroft,  iv.  298,  307),  Stephens  (ii.  310),  Dupaix  (pi. 
xi.),  Kingsborough  (iv.  pi.  13),  and  Charnay  (ch.  13  and 
14).  The  views  of  the  ruins  given  by  these  authorities 
mainly  make  up  the  stock  of  cuts  in  all  the  popular  narra- 
tives. 

The  most  interesting  of  the  carvings  is  what  is  known  as 
the  Tablet  of  the  Cross,  which  was  taken  from  one  of  the 
minor  buildings,  and  is  now  in  the  National  Museum  at 
Washington.  It  has  often  been  engraved,  but  such  repre- 
sentations never  satisfied  the  student  till  they  could  be 
tested  by  the  best  of  Charnay’s  photographs.  (Engravings 
in  Brasseur  and  Waldeck,  pi.  21,  22;  Rosny’s  Essai  sur 
le  deck  iff re  me  fit.  etc.  ; Minutoli’s  Beschreibung  einer  alien 
Stadt  in  Guatimala  (Berlin,  1832);  Stephens’s  Cent. 
Amer.^  W.  ; Bancroft,  Nat.  Races , iv.  333;  Charnay,  Les 
anciens  Villes,  and  Eng.  transl.  p.  255;  Nadaillac,  325; 
Po'iuelPs  Rept.,  i.  221 ; cf.  p.  234  ; Atner.  Antiquarian , vii. 
200.)  The  most  important  discussion  of  the  tablet  is 
Charles  Rau’s  Palc7ique  Tablet  in  the  U.  S.  National 
Museum  (Washington,  1879),  being  the  Smithsonian  Coniri. 


to  Knowledge,  no.  331,  or  vol.  xxii.  It  contains  an  account 
of  the  explorations  that  have  been  made  at  Palenqu£,  and 
a chapter  on  the  “ Aboriginal  writing  in  Mexico,  Central 
America,  and  Yucatan,  with  some  account  of  the  attempted 
translations  of  Maya  hieroglyphics.”  Rau’s  conclusion  is 
that  it  is  a Phallic  symbol.  Cf.  a summary  in  Amer.  An- 
tiquarian, vi.,  Jan.,  1884,  and  in  Amer.  Art  Review,  1880, 
p.  217.  Rau’s  paper  was  translated  into  Spanish  and 
French  : T abler o del  Palenque  en  el  Museo  nacional  de  los 
Estados-Unidos  [traducido  por  Joaquin  Davis  y Miguel 
Perez],  in  th e Anales  del  Museo  nacional.  Tomo  2,  pp. 
131-203.  (Mexico,  1880.)  La  Stile  de  Palenque  du  Mu - 
see  national  des  Etats-Unis , a Washington.  Traduit  de 
V Anglais  avec  autorisatio7i  de  V auteur.  In  the  A7males 
du  Musee  Gubiiet,  vol.  x.  (Paris,  1887.)  Rau’s  views  were 
criticised  by  Morgan. 

There  are  papers  by  Charencyon  the  interpretation  of  the 
hieroglyphs  in  Le  Museo7i  (Paris,  1882,  1S83). 

The  significance  of  the  cross  among  the  Nahuas  and 
Mayas  has  been  the  subject  of  much  controversy,  some  con- 
necting it  with  a possible  early  association  with  Christians  in 
ante-Columbian  days  (Bancroft,  iii.  468).  On  this  later  point 
see  Bamps,  Les  traditio7is  relatives  h Phonnne  blanc  et  au 
sigyie  de  la  cruz  e7i  A 77ierique  h PEpoque  precol lanbie 71 7ie, 
in  the  Co77iptc  re7idu,  Congrls  des  A77icrica7iistes  (Copen- 
hagen, 1883),  p.  125;  and  “Supposed  vestiges  of  early 
Christian  teaching  in  America,”  in  the  Catholic  Historical 
Researches  (vol.  i.,  Oct.,  1885).  The  symbolism  is  vari- 
ously conceived.  Bandelier  ( Archceol . Jour .)  holds  it  to 
be  the  emblem  of  fire,  indeed  an  ornamented  fire-drill, 
which  later  got  mixed  up  with  the  Spanish  crucifix.  Brin- 
ton  ( Myths  of  the  New  World , 95)  sees  in  it  the  four  cardi- 
nal points,  the  rain-bringers,  the  symbol  of  life  and  health, 
and  cites  (p.  96)  various  of  the  early  writers  in  proof.  Brin- 
ton  ( Ai7i . Hero  Myths , 155)  claims  to  have  been  the  first 
to  connect  the  Palenqu^  cross  with  the  four  cardinal  points. 


* Given  by  Rosny,  Doc.  Ecrits  de  la  A7itiq.  A7iier .,  p.  73,  as  types  of  the  short-headed  race  which  preceded  the  Aztec 
occupation.  They  are  from  sculptures  at  Copan.  Cf.  Stephens’s  Ce7it.  A inerica,  i.  139 : Bancroft,  iv.  101. 


196  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


There  have  been  only  two  statues  found  at  Palenqu6,  in  connection  with  the  Temple  of  the  Cross,1  but  the 
considerable  number  of  carved  figures  discovered  at  Copan,2  as  well  as  the  general  impression  that  these  latter 

ruins  are  the  oldest  on  the  American  conti- 
nent,3 have  made  in  some  respects  these  most 
celebrated  of  the  Honduras  remains  more  in- 
teresting than  those  of  Chiapas.  It  is  now 
generally  agreed  that  the  ruins  of  Copan  4 do 
not  represent  the  town  called  Copan,  assaulted 
and  captured  by  Hernando  de  Choves  in  1530, 
though  the  identity  of  names  has  induced 
some  writers  to  claim  that  these  ruins  were 
inhabited  when  the  Spaniards  came.®  The 
earliest  account  of  them  which  we  have  is  that 
in  Palacio’s  letter  to  Felipe  II.,  written  (1576) 
hardly  more  than  a generation  after  the  Con- 
quest, and  showing  that  the  ruins  then  were 
much  in  the  same  condition  as  later  described.6 
The  next  account  is  that  of  Fuentes  y Guz- 
man’s Historia  de  Guatemala  (1689),  now 
accessible  in  the  Madrid  edition  of  1882;  but 
for  a long  time  only  known  in  the  citation  in 
Juarros’  Guatemala  (p.  56),  and  through  those 
who  had  copied  from  JuarrosA  His  account 
is  brief,  speaks  of  Castilian  costumes,  and  is 
otherwise  so  enigmatical  that  Brasseur  calls 
it  mendacious.  Colonel  Galindo,  in  visiting 
the  ruins  in  1836,  confounded  them  with  the 
Copan  of  the  Conquest.8  The  ruins  also  came 
under  the  scrutiny  of  Stephens  in  1839,  and 
they  were  described  by  him,  and  drawn  by 
Catherwood,  for  the  first  time  with  any  full- 
ness and  care,  in  their  respective  works.9 

Always  associated  with  Copan,  and  perhaps 
even  older,  if  the  lower  relief  of  the  carvings 
can  bear  that  interpretation,  are  the  ruins  near 
the  village  of  Quirigud,  in  Guatemala,  and 


The  bird  and  serpent  — the  last  shown  better  in  Charnay’s 
photograph  than  in  Stephens’s  cut — is  {Myths,  119)  simply 
a rebus  of  the  air-god,  the  ruler  of  the  winds.  Brinton 
says  that  Waldeck,  in  a paper  on  the  tablet  in  the  Revue 
A meric aitie  (ii.  69),  came  to  a similar  conclusion.  Squier 
{Nicaragua,  ii.  337)  speaks  of  the  common  error  of  mis- 
taking the  tree  of  life  of  the  Mexicans  for  the  Christian 
symbol.  Cf.  Powell’s  Second  Rept .,  Bur.  of  Ethnol. , p. 
208 ; the  Fourth  Rept.,  p.  252,  where  discredit  is  thrown 
upon  Gabriel  de  Mortillet’s  Le  Signe  de  la  cross  avant  le 
Christianisme  (Paris,  1866) ; Joly  s Man  . before  Metals, 
339;  and  Charnay’s  Les  Anciens  Villes  (or  Eng.  transl.  p. 
85).  Cf.  for  various  applications  the  references  in  Ban- 
croft’s index  (v.  p.  671). 

1 Both  were  alike,  and  one  was  broken  in  two.  There 
are  engravings  in  Waldeck,  pi.  25;  Stephens,  ii.  344?  349  i 
Squier’s  Nicaragua,  1856,  ii.  337  ",  Bancroft,  iv.  337. 

2 These  have  been  the  subject  of  an  elaborate  folio, 
thought,  however,  to  be  of  questionable  value,  Die  Stein- 
bildwerke  von  Copan  und  Qtnrigua,  aufge nommen  von 
Heinrich  Meye ; historisch  erldutert  und  beschrieben  von 
Dr.  Julius  Schmidt  (Berlin,  1883),  of  which  there  is  an 
English  translation,  The  stone  sculptures  of  Copdn  and 
Quirigud ; translated  from  the  German  by  A.  D.  Savage 
(New  York,  1883).  It  gives  twenty  plates,  Catherwood’s 
plates,  and  the  cuts  in  Stephens,  with  reproductions  in  ac- 
cessible books  (Bancroft,  iv.  ch.  3;  Powell’s  First  Rept. 
Bur.  Ethn.  224;  Ruge’s  Gesch.  des  Zeitalters ; Arner.  An- 
tiquarian, viii.  204-6),  will  serve,  however,  all  purposes. 


3 Squier  says : “ There  are  various  reasons  for  believing 
that  both  Copan  and  Quirigua  antedate  Olosingo  and  Pa- 
lenqud,  precisely  as  the  latter  antedate  the  ruins  of  Quiche, 
Chichen-Itza,  and  Uxmal,  and  that  all  of  them  were  the 
work  of  the  same  people,  or  of  nations  of  the  same  race, 
dating  from  a high  antiquity,  and  in  blood  and  language 
precisely  the  same  that  was  found  in  occupation  of  the  coun- 
try by  the  Spaniards.” 

4 Named  apparently  from  a neighboring  village. 

6 Ref.  in  Bancroft,  iv.  79. 

6 This  account  can  be  found  in  Pacheco's  Col.  Doc.  ined. 
vi.  37,  in  Spanish;  in  Ternaux's  Coll.  (1840),  imperfect, 
and  in  the  Nouv.  Annales  des  Voyages,  1843,  v.  xcvii.  p.  18, 
in  French ; in  Squier's  Cent.  A merica,  242,  and  in  his  ed. 
of  Palacio  (N.  Y.  i860),  in  English;  and  in  Alexander  von 
Frantzius’s  San  Salvador  und  Honduras  im  Jahre  1576, 
with  notes  by  the  translator  and  by  C.  H.  Berendt. 

2 Stephens,  Cent.  Am.,  i.  131,  144?  Warden,  71;  Now 
vel/es  Annales  des  Voyages,  xxxr.  329;  Bancroft,  iv.  82  ; 
Bull,  de  la  Soc.  de  Geog.  de  Paris,  1836,  v.  267;  Short,  56, 
82,  — not  to  name  others. 

8 His  account  is  in  th eAmer.  Antig.  Soc.  Trans. , ii. ; 
Bull.  Soc.  de  Gtog.  1835 ; Dupaix,  a summary,  i.  div.  2, 
p.  73  ; Bradford’s  A tner.  Antig  , in  part.  Galindo’s  draw- 
ings are  unknown.  Stephens  calls  his  account  1 unsatisfac- 
tory and  imperfect.” 

9 Central  America,  i.  ch.  5-7;  Views  of  Anc.Mts.  It 
is  Stephens’s  account  which  has  furnished  the  basis  of  those 
given  by  Bancroft  (iv.  ch.  3);  Baldwin,  p.  111 ; Short,  356; 


* From  Meye  and  Schmidt's  Stone  Sculptures  of  Copdn  and  Quirigud  (N.  Y.,  1883). 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


197 


known  by  that  name.  Catherwood  first  brought  them  into  notice  ; 1 but  the  visit  of  Karl  Scherzer  in  1854  pro- 
duced the  most  extensive  account  of  them  which  we  have,  in  his  Ein  Besuch  bei  den  Ruinen  von  Quirigua 
(Wien,  1855)  2 

The  principal  explorers  of  Nicaragua  have  been  Ephraim  George  Squier,  in  his  Nicaragua ,3  and  Frederick 
Boyle,  in  his  Ride  across  a Continent  (Lond.  1868), 4 and  their  results,  as  well  as  the  scattered  data  of  others,5 
are  best  epitomized  in  Bancroft  (iv.  ch.  2),  who  gives  other  references  to  second-hand  descriptions  (p.  29). 
Since  Bancroft’s  survey  there  have  been  a few  important  contributions.6 


III.  Bibliographical  Notes  on  the  Picture-Writing  of  the  Nahuas  and  Mayas. 

In  considering  the  methods  of  record  and  communication  used  by  these  peoples,  we  must  keep  in  mind 
the  two  distinct  systems  of  the  Aztecs  and  the  Mayas ; 7 and  further,  particularly  as  regards  the  former,  we 
must  not  forget  that  some  of  these  writings  were  made  after  the  Conquest,  and  were  influenced  in  some 
degree  by  Spanish  associations.  Of  this  last  class  were  land  titles  and  catechisms,  for  the  native  system 
obtained  for  some  time  as  a useful  method  with  the  conquerors  for  recording  the  transmission  of  lands  and 
helping  the  instruction  by  the  priests.8 

It  is  usual  in  tracing  the  development  of  a hieroglyphic  system  to  advance  from  a purely  figurative  one  — 
in  which  pictures  of  objects  are  used  — through  a symbolic  phase ; in  which  such  pictures  are  interpreted  con- 
ventionally instead  of  realistically.  It  was  to  this  last  stage  that  the  Aztecs  had  advanced;  but  they  mingled 
the  two  methods,  and  apparently  varied  in  the  order  of  reading,  whether  by  lines  or  columns,  forwards,  up- 
wards, or  backwards.  The  difficulty  of  understanding  them  is  further  increased  by  the  same  object  holding 
different  meanings  in  different  connections,  and  still  more  by  the  personal  element,  or  writer’s  style,  as  we 
should  call  it,  which  was  impressed  on  his  choice  of  objects  and  emblems.9  This  rendered  interpretation  by  no 


means  easy  to  the  aborigines  themselves,  and  we  have 

Nadaillac,  328,  and  all  others.  Bancroft  in  his  bibliog. 
note  (iv.  pp.  79-81),  which  has  been  collated  with  my  own 
notes,  mentions  others  of  less  importance,  particularly  the 
report  of  Center  and  Hardcastle  to  the  Amer.  Etlinol.  Soc. 
in  i860  and  1862,  and  the  photographs  made  by  Ellerley, 
which  Brasseur  {Hist.  Hat.  Civ.  i.  96 ; ii.  493  ; Palenqid , 
8,  17)  found  to  confirm  the  drawings  and  descriptions  of 
Catherwood  and  Stephens. 

Stephens  {Cent.  Am.,  i.  133)  made  a plan  of  the  ruins  re- 
produced in  Annates  des  Voyages  (1841,  p.  57),  which  is 
the  basis  of  that  given  by  Bancroft  (iv.  85).  Dr.  Julius 
Schmidt,  who  was  a member  of  the  Squier  expedition  in 
1852-53,  furnished  the  historical  and  descriptive  text  to  a 
work  which  in  the  English  translation  by  A.  D.  Savage 
is  known  as  Stone  Sculptures  of  Copan  and  Quirigua , 
drawn  by  Hei?irich  Mcye  (N.  Y.,  1883).  What  Stephens 
calls  the  Copan  idols  and  altars  are  considered  by  Morgan 
{Houses  and  House  Life , 257),  following  the  analogy  of  the 
customs  of  the  northern  Indians,  to  be  the  grave-posts  and 
graves  of  Copan  chiefs.  Bancroft  (iv.  ch.  3)  covers  the 
other  ruins  of  Honduras  and  San  Salvador;  and  Squier  has 
a paper  on  those  of  Tenampua  in  the  H.  V.  Hist.  Soc. 
Proc.,  1853. 

1 Stephens’s  Central  America , ii.  ch.  7;  and  Nouvellcs 
Annales  des  Voyages , vol.  lxxxviii.  376,  derived  from  Cath- 
erwood. 

2 Other  travellers  who  have  visited  them  are  John  Baily, 
Central  America  (Lond.  1850);  A.  P.  Maudsley,  Explo- 
rations in  Guatemala  (Lond.  1883),  with  map  and  plans 
of  ruins,  in  the  Proc.  Roy.  Geog.  Soc.  p.  185;  W.  T.  Brig- 
ham’s Guatemala  (N.  Y.,  1886).  Bancroft  (iv.  109)  epito- 
mizes the  existing  knowledge ; but  the  remains  seem  to  be 
less  known  than  any  other  of  the  considerable  ruins.  There 
are  a few  later  papers : G.  Williams  on  the  Antiquities  of 
Guatemala,  in  the  Smithsonian  Report,  1876;  Simeon  Ha- 
bel’s  “ Sculptures  of  Santa  Lucia  Cosumalhuapa  in  Guate- 
mala ” in  the  Smithson.  Contrib.  xxii.  (Washington,  1878), 
or  “ Sculptures  de  Santa  (Lucia)  Cosumalwhuapa  dans  le 
Guatemala,  avec  une  relation  de  voyages  dans  l’Amdrique 
Centrale  et  sur  les  cotes  occidentales  de  l’Am^rique  du  Sud, 
par  S.  Habel.  Traduit  de  l’anglais,  par  J.  Pointet,’’  with 
eight  plates,  in  the  Annales  du  Musee  Guimet , vol.  x.  pp. 

1 19-259  (Paris,  1887);  Philipp  Wilhelm  Adolf  Bastian’s 
“ Stein  Sculpturen  aus  Guatemala,”  in  the  Jahrbuch  derk. 


statements  that  when  native  documents  were  referred 

Museetizu  Berlin , 18S2,  or  “ Notice  sur  les  pierces  sculptees 
du  Guatemala  recemment  acquises  par  le  Musee  royal  d’eth- 
nographie  de  Berlin.  Traduit  avec  autorisation  de  l’auteur 
par  J.  Pointet,”  in  the  Annales  du  Musee  Guimet , vol.  x. 
pp.  261-305  (Paris,  18S7) ; and  C.  E.  Vreeland  and  J.  F. 
Bransford,  on  the  A utilities  at  Pantaleon , Guatemala 
(Washington,  1885),  from  the  Smithsonian  Report  for 
1884. 

3 N icaragua  ; its  people , scenery , monuments , and  the 
proposed  biter  oceanic  canal  (N.  Y.,  1856;  revised  i860),  a 
portion  (pp.  303-362)  referring  to  the  modern  Indian  occu- 
pants. Squier  was  helped  by  his  official  station  as  U-  S- 
charg^  d’affaires ; and  the  archaeological  objects  brought 
away  by  him  are  now  in  the  National  Museum  at  Washing- 
ton. He  published  separate  papers  in  th e Amer.  Ethnol. 
Soc.  Pra?is.  ii.  ; Smithsonian  Ann.  Rept.  v.  (1850);  Har- 
per's Monthly , x.  and  xi.  Cf.  list  in  Pilling,  nos.  3717,  etc. 

4 His  explorations  were  in  1865-66.  He  carried  off  what 
he  could  to  the  British  Museum. 

5 Like  Bedford  Pirn  and  Berthold  Seemann’s  Dottings 
on  the  Roadside  in  Panama , Nicaragua , and  Mosquito 
(Lond.,  1869). 

6 J.  F.  Bransford’s  “Archaeological  Researches  in  Nica- 
ragua,” in  the  Smithsonian  Contrib.  (Washington,  1881). 
Karl  Bovallius’s  Nicaraguan  A ntiquities , with  plates 
(Stockholm,  1886),  published  by  the  Swedish  Society  of  An- 
thropology and  Geography,  figures  various  statues  and 
other  relics  found  by  the  author  in  Nicaragua,  and  he  says 
that  his  drawings  are  in  some  instances  more  exact  than 
those  given  by  Squier  before  the  days  of  photography.  In 
his  introduction  he  describes  the  different  Indian  stocks  of 
Nicaragua,  and  disagrees  with  Squier.  He  gives  a useful 
map  of  Nicaragua  and  Costa  Rica. 

7 It  is  only  of  late  years  that  they  have  been  kept  apart, 
for  the  elder  writers  like  Kingsborough,  Stephens,  and 
Brantz  Mayer,  confounded  them. 

8 The  Father  Alonzo  Ponce,  who  travelled  through  Yu- 
catan in  1586,  is  the  only  writer,  according  to  Brinton 
{Books  of'Chilan  Balam,  p.  5),  who  tells  us  distinctly  that 
the  early  missionaries  made  use  of  aboriginal  characters  in 
giving  religious  instruction  to  the  natives  {Relacion  Breve 
y Verdaderd). 

9 Leon  y Gama  tells  us  that  color  as  well  as  form  seems 
to  have  been  representative. 


198  NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


to  them  it  required  sometimes  long  consultations  to  reach  a common  understanding.1  The  additional  step 
by  which  objects  stand  for  sounds,  the  Aztecs  seem  not  to  have  taken,  except  in  the  names  of  persons  and 
places,  in  which  they  understpod  the  modern  child’s  art  of  the  rebus,  where  such  symbol  more  or  less  clearly 
stands  for  a syllable,  and  the  representation  was  usually  of  conventionalized  forms,  somewhat  like  the  art 
of  the  European  herald.  Thus  the  Aztec  system  was  what  Daniel  Wi’.son2  calls  “ the  pictorial  suggestion  of 
associated  ideas.”  3 The  phonetic  scale,  if  not  comprehended  in  the  Aztec  system,  made  an  essential  part  of 


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let,  w^rf 

FAC-SIMILE  OF  A PART  OF  LANDA’S  MS.* 


1 See  references  on  the  accepted  difficulties  in  Native 
Races,  ii.  531.  Mrs.  Nuttall  claimsto  have  observed  certain 
complemental  signs  in  the  Mexican  graphic  system,  “which 
renders  a misinterpretation  of  the  Nahuatl  picture-writings 
impossible  ” (A »*.  Asso.  Adv.  Science , Proc.,  xxxv.  (Aug., 
1886) ; Peabody  Mus.  Papers,  i.  App. 

2 Prehist.  Man,  ii.  57,  64,  for  his  views. 

3 Bancroft,  Native  Races,  ii.  ch.  17  (pp.  542>  552)  gives 
a good  description  of  the  Aztec  system,  with  numerous 
references;  but  on  this  system,  and  on  the  hieroglyphic 
element  in  general,  see  Gomara  ; Bernal  Diaz  ; Motolinfa 


in  Icazbalceta’s  Collection,  i.  186,  209;  Ternaux’s  Col- 
lection, x.  250;  Kingsborough,  vi.  87;  viii.  190;  ix.  201, 
235,  287,  325;  Acosta,  lib.  vi.  cap.  7;  Sahagun,  i.  p.  iv. ; 
Torquemada,  i.  29,  30,  36,  149,  253;  ii.  263,  544;  Las 
Casas’s  Hist.  Apologetica ; Purchas’s  Pilgrimes,  iii.  1069; 
iv.  1135;  Clavigero,  ii.  187;  Robertson’s  America;  Botu- 
rini’s  Idea,  pp.  5,  77.  87,  96,  u2,  ”6;  Humboldt’s  Vues, 
i.  177,  192  ; Veytia,  i.  6,  250;  Gallatin  in  Am.  Ethn.  Sac. 
Trans,  i.  126,  165 ; Prescott’s  Mexico,  i.  ch.  4 ; Brasseur’s 
Nat.  Civ.,  i.  pp.  xv,  xvii ; Domenech’s  Manuscrit  picto- 
graphique,  introd. ; Mendoza,  in  the  Boletin  Soc.  Mex. 


* After  a fac-simile  in  the  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer.de  France,  nouv.  ser.,  ii.  34-  («•  ph  xlx-of  Rosny  s Essaisur 

le  dichiffrement,  etc.)  It  is  a copy,  not  the  original,  of  Landa’s  text,  but  a nearly  contemporary  one  (made  thirty  years 

after  Landa’s  death),  and  the  only  one  known.  . . . - 

Note  to  opposite  Cut.  - This  representation  of  Yucatan  hieroglyph.es  is  a reduction  of  pi.  ..  mLton  de  Rosny  s 
Essai  surle  dichiffrement  de  I hr  dure  hieratiquede  TA  merique  Centrale,  Pans,  1876.  Cf.  Bancroft,  iv.  92  ; lort,  405 


200 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


the  Maya  hieroglyphics,  and  this  was  the  great  distinctive  feature  of  the  latter,  as  we  learn  from  the  early 
descriptions,1  and  from  the  alphabet  which  Landa  has  preserved  for  us.  It  is  not  only  in  the  codices  or 
books  of  the  Mayas  that  their  writing  is  preserved  to  us,  but  in  the  inscriptions  of  their  carved  architectural 
remains.2 

When  the  Abbe  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg  found,  in  1863,  in  the  library  of  the  Royal  Academy  of  History  at 
Madrid,  the  MS.  of  Landa’s  Relation , and  discovered  in  it  what  purported  to  be  a key  to  the  Maya  alphabet, 
there  were  hopes  that  the  interpretation  of  the  Maya  books  and  inscriptions  was  not  far  off.  Twenty-five 
years,  however,  has  not  seen  the  progress  that  was  wished  for ; and  if  we  may  believe  Valentini,  the  alphabet 
of  Landa  is  a pure  fabrication  of  the  bishop  himself  ;3  and  even  some  of  those  who  account  it  genuine,  like  Le 
Plongeon,  hold  that  it  is  inadequate  in  dealing  with  the  older  Maya  inscriptions.4  Cyrus  Thomas  speaks  of 
this  alphabet  as  simply  an  attempt  of  the  bishop  to  pick  out  of  compound  characters  their  simple  elements 
on  the  supposition  that  something  like  phonetic  representations  would  be  the  result.5  Landa’s  own  descrip 
tion 6 of  the  alphabet  accompanying  his  graphic  key  7 is  very  unsatisfactory,  not  to  say  incomprehensible. 
Brasseur  has  tried  to  render  it  in  French,  and  Bancroft  in  English  ; but  it  remains  a difficult  problem  to  in- 
terpret it  intelligibly. 

Brasseur  very  soon  set  himself  the  task  of  interpreting  the  Troano  manuscript  by  the  aid  of  this  key,  and 
he  soon  had  the  opportunity  of  giving  his  interpretation  to  the  public  when  the  Emperor  Napoleon  III.  or- 
dered that  codex  to  be  printed  in  the  sumptuous  manner  of  the  imperial  press.8  The  efforts  of  Brasseur  met 


Geog 2de  ed.  i.  896;  Madier  de  Montjau’s  Chronologic 
hieroglyph ico-phonetic  des  rois  Azteques , de  I 322  a 1322 , 
with  an  introduction  “ sur  l’Ecriture  Mexicaine  Lubbock’s 
Prehistoric  Times , 279,  and  his  Origin  0/  Civilization , 
ch.  2;  E.  B.  Tylor’s  Researches  into  the  Early  Hist,  oj 
Mankind , 89;  Short’s  No.  Amer.  of  Antiq .,  ch.  8;  Mul- 
ler’s Chips , i.  317;  The  Abbe  Jules  Pipart  in  Compte- 
rendu , Congres  des  Amer.  1877,  ii.  346;  Isaac  Taylor’s 
Alphabets;  Foster’s  Prehistoric  Races , 322;  Nadaillac, 
376,  not  to  cite  others.  Bandelier  has  discussed  the  Mex- 
ican paintings  in  his  paper  u On  the  sources  for  aboriginal 
history  of  Spanish  America  ” in  Am.  Asso.  Adv.  Science , 
Proc.,  xxvii.  (1878).  See  also  Peabody  Mus.  Reports , ii. 
631;  and  Orozco  y Berra’s  “Codice  Mendozino  ” in  the 
Anales  del  Musco  National,  vol . i . Mrs.  N uttall’s  views 
are  in  the  Peabody  Mus .,  Twentieth  Report , p.  567.  Qua- 
ritch  ( Catal . 188 5,  nos.  29040,  etc.)  advertised  some  original 
Mexican  pictures;  a native  MS.  pictorial  record  of  apart 
of  the  Tezcuco  domain  (supposed  a.  d.  1530),  and  perhaps 
one  of  the  “ pinturas  ” mentioned  by  Ixtlilxochitl ; a colored 
Mexican  calendar  on  a single  leaf  of  the  same  supposed 
date  and  origin ; with  other  MSS.  of  the  fifteenth  and  six- 
teenth centuries.  (Cf.  also  his  Catal.,  Jan.,  Feb.,  1888.) 

The  most  important  studies  upon  the  Aztec  system  have 
been  those  of  Aubin.  Cf.  his  Memoire  sur  la  peinture 
didactique  et  Vccriture  figurative  des  A nciens  Mexicains , 
in  the  A rchives  de  la  Soc.  A mer.  de  France , iii.  225 
( Revue  Orient,  et  Amer.),  in  which  he  contended  for  the 
rebus-like  character  of  the  writings.  He  made  further  con- 
tributions to  vols.  iv.  and  v.  (1859-1861).  Cf.  his  “ Examen 
des  anciennes  peintures  figuratives  de  l’ancien  M^xique,” 
in  the  new  series  of  Archives,  etc  , vol.  i.  ; and  the  introd. 
to  Brasseur’s  Nations  Civilisees , p.  xliv. 

1 Bancroft  {Nat.  Races , ii.  ch.  24)  translates  these  from 
Landa,  Peter  Martyr,  Cogulludo,  Viilagutierre,  Mendieta, 
Acosta,  Benzoni,  and  Herrera,  and  thinks  all  the  modern 
writers  (whom  he  names,  p.  770)  have  drawn  from  these 
earlier  ones,  except,  perhaps,  Medel  in  Notiv.  Annates  des 
Voyages , xcvii.  49.  Cf.  Wilson,  Prehistoric  Man , ii.  61. 
It  will  be  seen  later  that  Holden  discredits  the  belief  in  any 
phonetic  value  of  the  Maya  system.  But  compare  on  the 
phonetic  value  of  the  Mexican  and  Maya  systems,  Brinton 
in  Amer.  Antiquarian  (Nov.  1886);  Lazarus  Geiger’s 
Contrib.  to  the  Hist,  of  the  Development  of  the  Human 
Race  (Eng.  tr.  by  David  Asher).  London,  1880,  p.  75; 
and  Zelia  Nuttall  in  Am.  Ass.  Adv.  Set.  Proc.,  Ang.  1886. 

2 Dr.  Bernoulli,  who  died  at  San  Francisco,  in  Califor- 
nia, in  1878,  and  whose  labors  are  commemorated  in  a no- 
tice in  the  Vcrhandlungen  der  Naturforschenden  Gesell- 
schaft  (vi.  710)  at  Basle,  found  at  Tikal,  in  Guatemala,  some 
fragments  of  sculptured  panels  of  wood,  bearing  hiero- 
glyphics as  well  as  designs,  which  he  succeeded  in  purchas- 
ing, and  they  were  finally  deposited  in  1879  in  the  Ethno- 


logical Museum  in  Basle,  where  Rosny  saw  them,  and  de- 
scribes them,  with  excellent  photographic  representations, 
in  his  Doc.  Ecrits  de  /’  Antiq.  Amer.  (p.  97).  These  tablets 
are  the  latest  additions  to  be  made  to  the  store  already  pos- 
sessed from  Palenque,  as  given  by  Stephens  in  his  Central 
America , Chiapas , and  Yucatan ; those  of  the  Temple  of 
the  Cross  at  Palenque,  after  Waldeck's  drawings  in  the 
Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer.  de  France  (ii.,  1864);  that 
from  Kabah  in  Yucatan,  given  by  Rosny  in  his  Archives 
P allograph iques  (i.  p.  178;  Atlas,  pi.  xx.),  and  one  from 
Chichen-Itza,  figured  by  Le  Plongeon  in  L 'Illustration , 
Feb.  10,  1882  ; not  to  name  other  engravings.  Rosny  holds 
that  Rail’s  Palenque  Tablet  (Washington,  1879)  gives  the 
first  really  serviceably  accurate  reproduction  of  that  in- 
scription. Cf.  on  Maya  inscriptions,  Bancroft,  ii.  775  ; iv. 
91,97,234;  Morelet’s  Travels;  and  Le  Plongeon  in  A m. 
Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s.,  i.  246.  This  last  writer  has  been 
thought  to  let  his  enthusiasm  — not  to  say  dogmatism  — 
turn  his  head,  under  which  imputation  he  is  not  content, 
naturally  ( Ibid.  p.  282). 

3 “ Landa’s  alphabet  a Spanish  fabrication,’’  appeared 
in  the  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  April,  1880.  In  this,  Phi- 
lipp J.  J.  Valentini  interprets  all  that  the  old  writers  say  of 
the  ancient  writings  to  mean  that  they  were  pictorial  and  not 
phonetic ; and  that  Landa’s  purpose  was  to  devise  a vehicle 
which  seemed  familiar  to  the  natives,  through  which  he 
could  communicate  religious  instruction.  His  views  have 
been  controverted  by  Leon  de  Rosny  {Doc.  Ecrits  de  la 
Antiq.  Amer.  p.  91);  and  Brinton  {Maya  Chronicles , 61), 
calls  them  an  entire  misconception  of  Landa’s  purpose. 

4 Am.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  n.  s.,  i.  251. 

5 Troano  MS.,  p.  viii 

G Relation . Brasseur’s  ed.,  section  xli. 

7 This  is  given  in  the  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer.  de 
France , ii.  pi  iv. : in  Brasseur’s  ed.  of  Landa;  in  Ban- 
croft’s Nat.  Races,  ii.  779;  in  Short,  425  ; Rosny  {Essai 
sur  le  dechiff.  etc.,  pi.  xiii.)  gives  a “ Tableau  des  carac- 
teres  phonetique  Mayas  d’apres  Diego  de  Landa  et  Bras- 
seur de  Bourbourg.” 

8 Manuscrit  Troano  Etudes  sur  le  systhne  graphique  et 
la  langue  des  Mayas  (Paris,  1869-70)  — the  first  volume 
containing  a fac-simile  of  the  Codex  in  seventy  plates, 
with  Brasseur’s  explications  and  partial  interpretation. 
In  the  second  volume  there  is  a translation  of  Gabriel  de 
Saint  Bonaventure’s  Grammaire  Maya,  a “ Chrestoma- 
thie”  of  Maya  extracts,  and  a Maya  lexicon  of  more  than 
10,000  words.  Brasseur  published  at  the  same  time  ( 1869) 
in  the  Memoires  de  la  Soc.  d' Ethnographic  a Lettrc  a PI. 
Leon  de  Rosny  sur  la  decouverte  de  documents  relatifs  a la 
haute  anti  quite  americaine,  et  sur  le  dechiff:  ement  et  V in- 
terpretation de  Vccriture  phonetique  et  figurative  de  la 
longue  Maya  ( Paris,  1869).  He  explained  his  application 
of  Landa’s  alphabet  in  the  introduction  to  the  MS.  Troano , 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


201 


with  hardly  a sign  of  approval.  Leon  de  Rosny  criticised  him,1  and  Dr.  Brinton  found  in  his  results  nothing 
to  commend.2 

No  one  has  approached  the  question  of  interpreting  these  Maya  writings  with  more  careful  scrutiny  than 
Leon  de  Rosny,  who  first  attracted  attention  with  his 
comparative  study,  Les  ecritures  figuratives  et  hierogly- 
phiques  des  differens  peuples  anciens  et  moderns  (Paris, 
i860;  again,  1870,  augmentee).  From  1869  to  1871  he 
published  at  Paris  four  parts  of  Archives  paleographiques 
de  V Orient  et  de  V Amerique,  publiees  avec  des  notices 
historiques  et  philologiques , in  which  he  included  several 
studies  of  the  native  writings,  and  gave  a bibliography 
(pp.  101-115)  of  American  paleography  up  to  that  time. 

His  L? interpretation  des  a?iciens  textes  Mayas  made  part 
of  the  first  volume  of  the  Archives  de  la  Soc . Ameri- 
came  de  France  (new  series).  His  chief  work,  making 
the  second  volume  of  the  same,  is  his  Essai  sur  le  de- 
chiffreme7it  de  Vecriture  hieratique  de  V Amerique  Cen- 
tral (Paris,  1876),  and  it  is  the  most  thorough  examina- 
tion of  the  problem  yet  made.3  The  last  part  (4th)  was 
published  in  1878,  and  a Spanish  translation  appeared  in 
i8$i. 

Wm.  Bollaert,  who  had  paid  some  attention  to  the  pa- 
leography of  America,4  was  one  of  the  earliest  in  Eng- 
land to  examine  Brasseur’s  work  on  Landa,  which  he  did 
in  a memoir  read  before  the  Anthropological  Society ,5  and 
later  in  an  “ Examination  of  the  Central  American  hiero- 
glyphs by  the  recently  discovered  Maya  alphabet.”  6 Brin- 
ton 7 calls  his  conclusions  fanciful,  and  Le  Plongeon 
claims  that  the  inscription  in  Stephens,  which  Bollaert 
worked  upon,  is  inaccurately  given,  and  that  Bollaert’s  re- 
sults were  nonsense.8  Hyacinthe  de  Charency’s  efforts 
have  hardly  been  more  successful,  though  he  attempted 
the  use  of  Landa’s  alphabet  with  something  like  scientific 

care.  He  examined  a small  part  of  the  inscription  of  the  Palenque  tablet  of  the  Cross  in  his  Essai  de 
dechiffrement  d'un  fragment  d’ inscription  palcnquceneP 

Dr.  Brinton  translated  Charency’s  results,  and,  adding  Landa’s  alphabet,  published  his  Ancie7it  phonetic 
alphabet  of  Yucata7i  (N.  Y.,  1870),  a small  tract.10  His  continued  studies  were  manifest  in  the  introduction 
on  “ The  graphic  system  and  the  ancient  records  of  the  Mayas  ” to  Cyrus  Thomas’s  Manuscript  Troa7ioX 1 
In  this  paper  Dr.  Brinton  traces  the  history  of  the  attempts  which  have  thus  far  been  made  in  solving  this 
perplexing  problem.12  The  latest  application  of  the  scientific  spirit  is  that  of  the  astronomer  E.  S.  Holden, 


i.*  p.  36.  Brasseur  later  confessed  he  had  begun  at  the 
wrong  end  of  the  MS.  (Bib.  Mex.-Guat.,  introd.).  The 
pebble-shape  form  of  the  characters  induced  Brasseur  to  call 
them  calculifomn ; and  Julien  Duchateau  adopted  the 
term  in  his  paper  “ Sur  Pecriture  calculiforme  des  Mayas” 
in  the  A7i7iuaire  de  la  Soc.  A7ner.  (Paris,  1874),  iii.  p.  31. 

1 L'ecriture  hieratique,  and  Archives  de  la  Soc.  A 771. 
de  France,  n.  s.,  ii.  35. 

2 Ancient  Phonetic  Alphabets  of  Yucatan  (N.  Y.,  1870), 

p.  7. 

3 It  is  the  development  of  a paper  given  at  the  Nancy 
session  of  the  Congr&s  des  Am^ricanistes  (1875).  Landa’s 
alphabet  with  the  variations  make  262  of  the  700  signs 
which  Rosny  catalogues.  He  printed  his  “ Nouvelles  Re- 
cherches  pour  l’interpretation  des  caract&res  de  l’Am^rique 
Centrale  ” in  the  A r chives,  etc.,  iii.  1 18.  There  is  a paper  on 
Rosny’s  studies  by  De  la  Rada  in  the  Compte-rendu  of  the 
Copenhagen  session  (p.  355)  of  the  Congr&s  des  America- 
nistes.  Rosny’s  Documents  Icrits  de  Vantiquite  A meric  nine 
(Paris,  1882),  from  the  Memoires  de  la  Socicte  d' Ethno- 
graphic (1881),  covers  his  researches  in  Spain  and  Portugal 
for  material  illustrative  of  the  pre-Columbian  history  of 
America.  Cf.  also  his  “ Les  sources  de  l’histoire  ant£ 


columbienne  du  nouveau  monde,”  in  the  Mhnoires  de  la 
Soc.  d' Ethnographic  (1877).  For  the  titles  in  full  of  Ros- 
ny’s linguistic  studies,  see  Pilling’s  Proof-sheets , p.  663. 

4 Antkropol.  Review , May,  1864;  Memoirs  of  the  A 71- 
thropol.  Soc.,  i. 

5 Me77ioirs , etc.,  ii.  298. 

6 Memoirs,  etc.,  1870,  iii.  288;  Trans.  Afithrop.  Inst . Gt. 
Britain. 

7 Introd.  to  Cyrus  Thomas’s  MS.  Troa7io. 

8 Am.  A7itiq.  Soc.  Proc.,71.  s.,  i.  250. 

9 Actes  de  la  Soc.  philologique , March,  1870.  Cf.  Revue 
de  Philologie,  i.  380  ; Recherches  sur  le  Codex  T roano  ( Paris, 
1S76) ; Actes,  etc.,  March,  1878  ; Baldwin’s  Anc.  Artierica, 
App. 

10  Cf.  Sabin's  A liter.  Bibliopolist , ii.  143. 

11  Co7iiributio7ts  to  N.  A.  Etlmology , PozuelPs  Stirvey, 
vol.  v.  Cf  also  his  Phonetic  eleme7its  in  the  graphic  sys- 
te7ii  of  the  Mayas  and  Mexicans  in  the  A mer.  A ntiquariafi 
(Nov.,  1886'),  and  separately  (Chicago,  1S86),  and  his  Iko - 
nomic  method  of  pho7ietic  zuriting  (Phila.,  1886).  Thomas 
in  The  A mer.  Afitiquarian  (March,  1886)  points  out  the 
course  of  his  own  studies  in  this  direction. 

12  Cf.  Short,  p.  425.  Dr.  Harrison  Allen  in  1875,  in  the 


* After  a cut  in  Wilson’s  Prehistoric  Ma7i,  ii.  p.  63.  It  is  also  given  in  Bancroft  (iv.  355),  and  others.  It  is  from  the 
Tablet  of  the  Cross. 


202 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


who  sought  to  eliminate  the  probabilities  of  recurrent  signs  by  the  usual  mathematical  methods  of  resolving 
systems  of  modern  cipher.1 

There  are  few  examples  of  the  aboriginal  ideographic  writings  left  to  us.  Their  fewness  is  usually  charged 
to  the  destruction  which  was  publicly  made  of  them  under  the  dominate  n of  the  Church  in  the  years  following 


LEON  DE  ROSNY* 


A mer.  Philosophical  Society's  Tra?is actions,  made  an  anal- 
ysis of  Landa’s  alphabet  and  the  published  codices.  Rau, 
in  his  Palenque  Tablet  of  the  U.  S.  Nat.  Museum  (ch.  5), 
examines  what  had  been  done  up  to  1879.  In  the  same 
year  Dr.  Carl  Schultz  - Sellack  wrote  on  “ Die  Amerika- 
nischen  Gotter  der  vier  Weltgegenden  und  ihre  Tempel  in 
Palenque,”  touching  also  the  question  of  interpretation  (. Zeit - 
schrift  fur  Ethnologies  vol.  xi.)  ; and  in  1880  Dr.  Forste- 
mann  examined  the  matter  in  his  introduction  to  his  repro- 
duction of  the  Dresden  Codex. 

1 Studies  in  Ce?itral  A merican  picture-writing  (Wash- 
ington, 1881),  extracted  from  the  First  Report  of  the  Bu- 
reau of  Ethnology.  His  method  is  epitomized  in  The  Cen- 
tury, Dec.,  1881.  He  finds  Stephens's  drawings  the  most 
trustworthy  of  all,  Waldeck’s  being  beautiful,  but  they  em- 
body “singular  liberties.”  His  examination  was  confined 
to  the  1500  separate  hieroglyphs  in  Stephens’s  Cetitral 
America.  Some  of  Holden’s  conclusions  are  worth  not- 
ing : “ The  Maya  manuscripts  do  not  possess  to  me  the 
same  interest  as  the  stones,  and  I think  it  may  be  certainly 
said  that  all  of  them  are  younger  than  the  Palenque  tablets, 
and  far  younger  than  the  inscriptions  at  Copan.”  “ I dis- 


trust the  methods  of  Brasseur  and  others  who  start  from 
the  misleading  and  unlucky  alphabet  handed  down  by 
Landa,”  by  forming  variants,  which  are  made  “ to  satisfy 
the  necessities  of  the  interpreter  in  carrying  out  some  pre- 
conceived idea.”  He  finds  a rigid  adherence  to  the  stand- 
ard form  of  a character  prevailing  throughout  the  same  in- 
scription. At  Palenque  the  inscriptions  read  as  an  English 
inscription  would  read,  beginning  at  the  left  and  proceeding 
line  by  line  downward.  “ The  system  employed  at  Pa- 
lenque and  Copan  was  the  same  in  its  general  character, 
and  almost  identical  even  in  details.”  He  deciphers  three 
proper  names : “ all  of  them  have  been  pure  picture-writ- 
ing, except  in  so  far  as  their  rebus  character  may  make 
them  in  a sense  phonetic.”  Referring  to  Valentini’s 
Landa  Alphabet  a Spanish  Fabrication,  he  agrees  in  that 
critic's  conclusions.  “While  my  own,”  he  adds,  “were 
reached  by  a study  of  the  stones  and  in  the  course  of  a 
general  examination,  Dr.  Valentini  has  addressed  himself 
successfully  to  the  solution  of  a special  problem.”  Holden 
thinks  his  own  solution  of  the  three  proper  names  points 
of  departure  for  subsequent  decipherers.  The  Maya  meth- 
od was  “ pure  picture-writing.  At  Copan  this  is  found  in 


* After  a photogravure  in  Les  Documents  lerits  de  V anti  quite  Americaine  (Paris,  1882).  Cf.  cut  in  Mhti.  de  la  Soc. 
d' Ethnograp hie  (1887),  xiii.  p.  71. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


203 


the  Conquest.1  The  alleged  agents  in  this  demolition  were  Bishop  Landa,  in  1562,  at  Mani,  in  Yucatan,2 
and  Bishop  Zumdrraga  at  Tlatelalco,  or,  as  some  say,  at  Tezcuco,  in  Mexico.3  Peter  Martyr1  has  told  us 
something  of  the  records  as  he  saw  them,  and  we  know  also  from  him,  and  from  their  subsequent  discovery  in 
European  collections,  that  some  examples  of  them  were  early  taken  to  the  Old  World.  We  have  further 
knowledge  of  them  from  Las  Casas  and  from  Landa  himself.5  There  have  been  efforts  made  of  late  years  by 
Icazbalceta  and  Canon  Carrillo  to  mitigate  the  severity  of  judgment,  particularly  as  respects  Zumdrraga.6 
The  first,  and  indeed  the  only  attempt  that  has  been  made  to  bring  together  for  mutual  illustration  all  that 
was  known  of  these  manuscripts  which  escaped  the  fire,'  was  in  the  great  work  of  the  Viscount  Kingsborough 
(b.  1795,  d.  1837).  It  was  while,  as  Edward  King,  he  was  a student  at  Oxford  that  this  nobleman’s  passion  for 
Mexican  antiquities  was  first  roused  by  seeing  an  original  Aztec  pictograph,  described  by  Purchas  ( Pilgrimes , 
vol.  iii.),  and  preserved  in  the  Bodleian.  In  the  studies  to  which  this  led  he  was  assisted  by  some  special 
scholars,  including  Obadiah  Rich,  who  searched  for  him  in  Spain  in  1830  and  1832,  and  who  after  Kingsbor- 
ough’s  death  obtained  a large  part  of  the  manuscript  collections  which  that  nobleman  had  amassed  ( Catalogue 
of  the  Sale,  Dublin,  1842).  Many  of  the  Kingsborough  manuscripts  passed  into  the  collection  of  Sir  Thomas 
Phillipps  {Catalogue,  no.  404),  but  the  correspondence  pertaining  to  Kingsborough’s  life-work  seems  to  have 
disappeared.  Phillipps  had  been  one  of  the  main  encouragers  of  Kingsborough  in  his  undertaking.8  Kings- 
borough, who  had  spent  £30,000  on  his  undertaking,  had  a business  dispute  with  the  merchants  who  furnished 
the  printing-paper,  and  he  was  by  them  thrown  into  jail  as  a debtor,  and  died  in  confinement.9 

Kingsborough’s  great  work,  the  most  sumptuous  yet  bestowed  upon  Mexican  archaeology,  was  published 
between  1830  and  1848,  there  being  an  interval  of  seventeen  years  between  the  seventh  and  eighth  volumes. 
The  original  intention  seems  to  have  embraced  ten  volumes,  for  the  final  section  of  the  ninth  volume  is  signa- 
tured as  for  a tenth.10  The  work  is  called:  Antiquities  of  Mexico  ; comprising  facsimiles  of  Ancient  Mexi- 
can Paintings  and  Hieroglyphics,  preserved  in  the  Royal  Libraries  of  Paris,  Berlin,  and  Dresden  ; in  the 
Imperial  Library  of  Vienna ; in  the  Vatican  Library : in  the  Borgian  Museum  at  Rome;  in  the  Library 
of  the  Institute  of  Bologna  ; and  in  the  Bodleian  Library  at  Oxford  ; together  with  the  Monuments  of  New 
Spain,  by  M.  Dupaix  ; illustrated  by  many  valuable  inedited  MSS.  With  the  theory  maintained  by  Kings- 
borough throughout  the  work,  that  the  Jews  were  the  first  colonizers  of  the  country,  we  have  nothing  to  do  here ; 
but  as  the  earliest  and  as  yet  the  largest  repository  of  hieroglyphic  material,  the  book  needs  to  be  examined. 
The  compiler  states  where  he  found  his  MSS.,  but  he  gives  nothing  of  their  history,  though  something  more 
is  now  known  of  their  descent.  Peter  Martyr  speaks  of  the  number  of  Mexican  MSS.  which  had  in  his  day 
been  taken  to  Spain,  and  Prescott  remarks  it  as  strange  that  not  a single  one  given  by  Kingsborough  was 
found  in  that  country.  There  are,  however,  some  to  be  seen  there  now.11  Comparisons  which  have  been  made 
of  Kingsborough’s  plates  show  that  they  are  not  inexact ; but  they  almost  necessarily  lack  the  validity  that 
the  modern  photographic  processes  give  to  fac-similes. 

Kingsborough’s  first  volume  opens  with  a fac-simile  of  what  is  usually  called  the  Codex  Mendoza,  preserved  in 
the  Bodleian.  It  is,  however,  a contemporary  copy  on  European  paper  of  an  original  now  lost,  which  was  sent 
by  the  Viceroy  Mendoza  to  Charles  V.  Another  copy  made  part  of  the  Boturini  collection,  and  from  this 
Lorenzana 12  engraved  that  portion  of  it  which  consists  of  tribute-rolls.  The  story  told  of  the  fate  of  the  orig- 

Sahagun  relates  that  earlier  than  Zumdrraga,  the  fourth 
ruler  of  his  race,  Itzcohuatl,  had  caused  a large  destruction 
of  native  writings,  in  order  to  remove  souvenirs  of  the  na- 
tional humiliation. 

7 Humboldt  was  one  of  the  earliest  to  describe  some  of 
these  manuscripts  in  connection  with  his  Atlas,  pi.  xiii. 

8 Cf.  Catal.  of  the  Phillipps  Coll.,  no.  404.  An  original 
colored  copy  of  the  Antiquities  of  Mexico,  given  by  Kings- 
borough to  Phillipps,  was  offered  of  late  years  by  Quaritch 
at^7o-^ioo;  it  was  published  at /175.  The  usual  colored 
copies  sell  now  for  about  ^40-^60 ; the  uncolored  for  about 
^3°-^35-  It  is  usually  stated  that  two  copies  were  printed 
on  vellum  (British  Museum,  Bodleian),  and  ten  on  large 
paper,  which  were  given  to  crowned  heads,  except  one, 
which  was  given  to  Obadiah  Rich.  Squier,  in  the  London 
Athenceum,  Dec.  13,  1856  (Allibone,  p.  1033),  drew  atten- 
tion to  the  omission  of  the  last  signature  of  the  Hist.  Chi- 
chimeca  in  vol.  ix. 

3 Rich,  Bib/.  Amer.  Nova,  ii.  233;  Gentleman  s Mag., 
May,  1837,  which  varies  in  some  particulars.  Cf.  for  other 
details  Sabin's  Dictionary,  ix.  485  ; De  Rosny  in  the  Rev. 
Orient  et  Amir.,  xii.  387.  R.  A.  Wilson  ( New  Conquest 
of  Mexico,  p.  68)  gives  the  violent  skeptical  view  of  the 
material. 

10  Sabin,  ix.,  no.  37,800. 

11  Leon  de  Rosny  [Doc.  lerits  deVAntiq.  Amir.,  p.  71) 
speaks  of  those  in  the  Museo  Archaeoldgico  at  Madrid. 

12  Hist.  Nueva  Espana. 


its  earliest  state  ; at  Palenque  it  was  already  highly  conven- 
tionalized.” 

1 See  references  in  Bancroft’s  Nat.  Races,  ii.  576. 

2 Cogulludo’s  Hist,  de  Yucatan,  3d  ed.,  i.  604. 

3 Prescott,  i.  104,  and  references. 

4 Dec.  iv.,  lib.  8. 

c Brasseur  de  Bourbourg’s  Troano  MS.,  i.  9.  Cf.  on 
the  Aztec  books  Kirk’s  Prescott,  i.  103  ; Brinton’s  Myths, 
10;  his  Aborig.  Amer.  Authors,  17;  and  on  the  Mexican 
paper,  Valentini  in  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.  Proc.,  2d  s.,  i.  58. 

0 Cf.  i cazbalceta’s  Don  Fray  Juan  de  Zumdrraga, pri- 
mer Obispo  y A rzobispo  de  Mexico  (/S2Q-qS).  E studio 
biogrdfico  y bibligrdfico.  Con  tin  aphid  ice  de  document  os 
inlditos  6 raros  (Mexico,  1881).  A part  of  this  work  was 
also  printed  separately  (fifty  copies)  under  the  title  of  De 
la  destruccton  de  antigiiedades  mtxicanas  atribuida  a los 
misioneros  en  general,  y particularmente  al  Illmo.  Sr.  D. 
Fr.  Juan  de  Zumdrraga,  primer  Obispo  y A rzobispo  de 
Mlxico  (Mexico,  1881).  In  this  he  exhausts  pretty  much 
all  that  has  been  said  on  the  subject  by  the  bishop  himself, 
by  Pedro  de  Gante,  Motolinfa,  Sahagdn,  Duran,  Acosta, 
Davila  Padilla,  Herrera,  Torquemada,  Ixtlilxochitl,  Rob- 
ertson, Clavigero,  Humboldt,  Bustamante,  Ternaux,  Pres- 
cott, Alaman,  etc.  Brasseur  (Nat.  Civil.,  ii.  4)saysof  Landa 
that  we  must  not  forget  that  he  was  oftener  the  agent  of 
the  council  for  the  Indies  than  of  the  Church.  Helps  (iii. 
374)  is  inclined  to  be  charitable  towards  a man  in  a skeptical 
age,  so  intensely  believing  as  Zumdrraga  was. 


204 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


inal  is,  that  on  its  passage  to  Europe  it  was  captured  by  a French  cruiser  and  taken  to  Paris,  where  it  was 
bought  by  the  chaplain  of  the  English  embassy,  the  antiquary  Purchas,  who  has  engraved  it.1  It  was  then  lost 


FAC-SIMILE  OF  PLATE  XXV  OF  THE  DRESDEN  CODEX* 

1 Pilgrimes,  vol.  iii.  (1625).  It  is  also  included  in  The-  CEdipus  ALgypticns;  Humboldt’s  plates,  xiii.,  Iviii.,  lix. 
venot’s  Coll,  de  Voyages  (1696),  vol.  ii. , in  a translation,  with  his  text,  in  which  he  quotes  Du  Palin’s  Study  of  H it* 

Clavigero  (i.  23)  calls  this  copy  faulty.  See  also  Kircher’s  roglyphics,  vol.  i.  See  the  account  in  Bancroft,  ii.  241. 

* From  Cyrus  Thomas’s  Manuscript  Troano. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


205 


sight  of,  and  if  Prescott’s  inference  is  correct  it  was  not  the  original,  but  the  Bodleian  copy,  which  came  into 
Purchas’  hands.1 

Beside  the  tribute-rolls,2  which  make  one  part  of  it,  the  MS.  covers  the  civil  history  of  the  Mexicans,  with  a 
third  part  on  the  discipline  and  economy  of  the  people,  which  renders  it  of  so  much  importance  in  an  archaeo- 
logical sense.3  The  second  reproduction  in  Kingsborough’s  first  volume  is  what  he  calls  the  Codex  Telleriano- 
Retnensis , preserved  in  the  Bibliotheque  Nationale  at  Paris,  and  formerly  owned  by  M.  Le  Tellier.4  The  rest 
of  this  initial  volume  is  made  up  of  fac-similes  of  Mexican  hieroglyphics  and  paintings,  from  the  Boturini  and 
Selden  collections,  which  last  is  in  the  Bodleian. 

The  second  Kingsborough  volume  opens  with  a reproduction  of  the  Codex  Vaticanus  (the  explanation  5 is 
in  volume  vi.),  which  is  in  the  library  of  the  Vatican,  and  it  is  known  to  have  been  copied  in  Mexico  by  Pedro 
de  los  Rios  in  1566.  It  is  partly  historical  and  partly  mythological.6  The  rest  of  this  volume  is  made  up 
of  fac-similes  of  other  manuscripts,  — one  given  to  the  Bodleian  by  Archbishop  Laud,  others  at  Bologna,7 8 
Vienna,3  and  Berlin. 

The  third  volume  reproduces  one  belonging  to  the  Borgian  Museum  at  Rome,  written  on  skin,  and  thought 
to  be  a ritual  and  astrological  almanac.  This  is  accompanied  by  a commentary  by  Frabega.9  Kingsborough 
gives  but  a single  Maya  MS.,  and  this  is  in  his  third  volume,  and  stands  with  him  as  an  Aztec  production. 
This  is  the  Dresden  Codex,  not  very  exactly  rendered,  which  is  preserved  in  the  royal  library  in  that  city,  for 
which  it  was  bought  by  Gotz,10  at  Vienna,  in  1739.  Prescott  (i.  107)  seemed  to  recognize  its  difference  from 
the  Aztec  MSS.,  without  knowing  precisely  how  to  class  it.11  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg  calls  it  a religious  and 
astrological  ritual.  It  is  in  two  sections,  and  it  is  not  certain  that  they  belong  together.  In  1880  it  was  re- 
produced at  Dresden  by  polychromatic  photography  (Chromo-Lichtdruck),  as  the  process  is  called,  under  the 
editing  of  Dr.  E.  Forstemann,  who  in  an  introduction  describes  it  as  composed  of  thirty-nine  oblong  sheets 
folded  together  like  a fan.  They  are  made  of  the  bark  of  a tree,  and  covered  with  varnish.  Thirty-five  have 
drawings  and  hieroglyphics  on  both  sides  ; the  other  four  on  one  side  only.  It  is  now  preserved  between  glass 
to  prevent  handling,  and  both  sides  can  be  examined.  Some  progress  has  been  made,  it  is  professed,  in  deci- 
phering its  meaning,  and  it  is  supposed  to  contain  “ records  of  a mythic,  historic,  and  ritualistic  character.” 12 

Another  script  in  Kingsborough,  perhaps  a Tezcucan  MS.,  though  having  some  Maya  affinities,  is  the 
Fejervary  Codex , then  preserved  in  Hungary,  and  lately  owned  by  Mayer,  of  Liverpool.13 

Three  other  Maya  manuscripts  have  been  brought  to  light  since  Kingsborough’s  day,  to  say  nothing  of  three 
others  said  to  be  in  private  hands,  and  not  described.14  Of  these,  the  Codex  Troano  has  been  the  subject  of 
much  study.  It  is  the  property  of  a Madrid  gentleman,  Don  Juan  Tro  y Ortolano,  and  the  title  given  to  the 
manuscript  has  been  somewhat  fantastically  formed  from  his  name  by  the  Abbe  Etienne  Charles  Brasseur 


1 Prescott,  i.  106.  He  thinks  that  a copy  mentioned  in 
Spineto’s  Lectures  on  the  Elements  of  H ieroglyphics,  and 
then  in  the  Escurial,  may  perhaps  be  the  original.  Hum- 
boldt calls  it  a copy. 

2 Humboldt  placed  some  tribute-rolls  in  the  Berlin 
library,  and  gave  an  account  of  them.  See  his  pi.  xxxvi. 

3 Cf.  references  in  Bancroft’s  Native  Races,  ii.  529.  The 
“ Explicacion  ” of  the  MS.  is  given  in  Kingsborough's  vol- 
ume v.,  and  an  “ interpretation  ” in  vol.  vi. 

4 Kingsborough’s  “ explicacion  ” and  “ explanation  ” are 
given  in  bis  vols.  v.  and  vi.  Rosny  has  given  an  “ explica- 
tion avec  notes  par  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg”  in  h\s  Ar- 
chives palcographiques  (Paris,  1S70-71},  p.  190,  with  an 
atlas  of  plates.  Cf.  references  in  Bancroft,  ii.  530;  and  in 
another  place  (iii.  191)  this  same  writer  cautions  the  reader 
against  the  translation  in  Kingsborough,  and  says  that  it 
has  every  error  that  can  vitiate  a translation.  Humboldt 
thinks  his  own  plates,  lv.  and  lvi.,  of  the  codex  carefully 
made. 

5 Prescott  says  (i.  108)  of  this  that  it  bears  evident  marks 
of  recent  origin,  when  “the  hieroglyphics  were  read  with 
the  eye  of  faith  rather  than  of  reason.”  Cf.  Bancroft,  Nat. 
Races,  ii.  527. 

0 Portions  of  it  are  also  reproduced  in  the  A rchives  de  la 
Soc.  A mir . de  Fratice  ; in  Rosny’s  Essai  sur  le  dcchiffre - 
ment  de  V Ecriturc  Hicratiquc ; and  in  Powell’s  Third 
Kept.  Bur.  of  Ethnology,  p.  56.  Cf.  also  Humboldt’s  At- 
las, pi.  xiii. ; and  H.  M.  Williams’s  translation  of  his  Aues, 
i.  145. 

7 It  is  known  to  have  been  given  in  1665  by  the  Marquis 
de  Caspi  by  Count  Valerio  Zani.  There  is  a copy  in  the 
museum  of  Cardinal  Borgia  at  Veletri. 

8 Known  to  have  been  given  in  1677  by  the  Duke  of  Saxe- 

Eisenach  to  the  Emperor  Leopold.  Some  parts  are  repro- 

duced in  Robertson’s  America,  Lond  , 1777,  ii.  482. 


9 Humboldt,  Vues  des  Cordillkres,  p.  89;  pi.  15,  27,  37; 
Prescott,  i.  106.  There  is  a single  leaf  of  it  reproduced  in 
Powell’s  Third  Rept.  Bur.  of  Eth .,  p.  33. 

10  Cf.  his  Deukwiirdigkeiten  der  Dresdejier  Bibliothek 
(1744),  P-  4- 

11  Stephens  ( Central  America , ii.  342,  453;  Yucatan,  ii. 
292,  453)  was  in  the  same  way  at  a loss  respecting  the  con- 
ditions of  the  knowledge  of  such  things  in  his  time.  Cf. 
also  Orozco  y Berra,  Geografia  de  las  Lenguas  de  Mexico , 
p.  101. 

12  Die  Mayahandschrift  dcr  k'dniglichcn  ojfentlichen 
Bibliothek  zu  Dresden  ; herausgegeben  von  E.  Fdrstemann 
(Leipzig,  1880).  Only  thirty  copies  were  offered  for  sale  at 
two  hundred  marks.  There  is  a copy  in  Harvard  College 
library.  Parts  of  the  manuscript  are  found  figured  in  dif- 
ferent publications:  Humboldt's  Vues  des  Cordillbres , ii. 
268,  and  pi.  16  and  45  ; Wuttke’s  Gesck.  der  Schrift.  At- 
las, pi.  22,  23  (Leipzig,  1872);  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Amer. 
de  France,  n.  s.,  vol.  i.  and  ii. ; Silvestre’s  Paleographie 
Universelle  ; Rosny’s  Les  Ecritures  fguratives  et  hiero • 
glyphiques  des  pcuples  anciens  et  modernes  (Paris,  i860, 
pi.  v.),  and  in  his  Essai  sur  le  dechiffrement , etc.;  Ruge, 
Zeitaltcr  dcr  Entdeckungen,  p.  559.  Cf.  also  Le  Noir  in 
A ntlquites  Mexicaines,  ii.  introd. ; Forstemann’s  separate 
monographs,  Der  Maya  apparat  in  Dresden  ( Centralblatt 
fur  Bibliothekswese n , 1885,  p.  182),  and  Erlauterungen 
zur  Mayahandschrift  der  koniglichen  offentlichen  Biblio- 
thek zu  Dresden  (Dresden,  1886);  Schellhas’  Die  Maya- 
Handschrift  zu  Dresden  (Berlin,  1886) ; C.  Thomas  on 
the  numerical  signs  in  A rch.  de  la  Soc.  A in.  de  France, 
n.  s.,  iii.  207. 

13  Cf.  Powell’s  Third  Rept.  Eth.  Bureau,  p.  32. 

14  Brinton’s  Maya  Chronicles,  66 ; Brasseur  de  Bour- 
bourg’s  Troano  { 1868). 


20 6 


NARRATIVE  AND  CRITICAL  HISTORY  OF  AMERICA. 


CODEX  CORTESIANUS* 

* From  a fac-simile  in  the  A rchives  de  la  Societe  A meric aine  de  France , nouv.  ser. , ii.  30. 


MEXICO  AND  CENTRAL  AMERICA. 


207 


— ^ 


,v 

V m fjCSn^'A* 


de  Bourbourg,  who  was  instrumental  in  its  recognition  about  1865  or  1866,  and  who  edited  a sumptuous  two- 
volume  folio  edition  with  chromo-lithographic  plates.1 

While  Leon  de  Rosny  was  preparing  his  Essai 
sur  le  dechiffrement  de  VEcriture  hieratique 
(1876),  a Maya  manuscript  was  offered  to  the 
Bibliothkque  Imperiale  in  Paris  and  declined,  be- 
cause the  price  demanded  was  too  high.  Photo- 
graphic copies  of  two  of  its  leaves  had  been  sub- 
mitted, and  one  of  these  is  given  by  Rosny  in  the 
Essai  (pi.  xi.).  The  Spanish  government  finally 
bought  the  MS.,  which,  because  it  was  supposed 
to  have  once  belonged  to  Cortes,  is  now  known  as 
the  Codex  Cortesianus.  Rosny  afterwards  saw 
it  and  studied  it  in  the  Museo  Archeoldgico  at 
Madrid,  as  he  makes  known  in  his  Doc.  Ecrits 
de  la  Antiq.  Ainer.,  p.  79,  where  he  points  out 
the  complementary  character  of  one  of  its  leaves 
with  another  of  the  MS.  Troano,  showing  them 
to  belong  together,  and  gives  photographs  of  the 
two  (pi.  v.  vi.),  as  well  as  of  other  leaves  (pi.  8 and 
9).  The  part  of  this  codex  of  a calendar  character 
(Tableau  des  Bacab)  is  reproduced  from  Rosny’s 
plate  by  Cyrus  Thomas  2 in  an  essay  in  the  Third 
Report  of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology , together 
with  an  attempted  restoration  of  the  plate,  which 
is  obscure  in  parts.  Finally  a small  edition  (85 
copies)  of  the  entire  MS.  was  published  at  Paris 
in  1883.3 

The  last  of  the  Maya  MSS.  recently  brought 
to  light  is  sometimes  cited  as  the  Codex  Perezi- 
anus , because  the  paper  in  which  it  was  wrapped, 
when  recognized  in  1859  by  Rosny,4 *  bore  the 
name  11  Perez  ” ; and  sometimes  designated  as 
Codex  Mexicanus,  or  Manuscrit  Yucateque  No. 

2,  of  the  National  Library  at  Paris.  It  was  a 
few  years  later  published  as  Manuscrit  dit 
Mexicain  No.  2 de  la  Bib  Hot  lib  que  Imperiale , 
photographic  par  ordre  de  S.  E.  M.  Duruy, 

ministre  de  V instruction  publique  (Paris,  1864,  in  folio,  50  copies).  The  original  is  a fragment  of  eleven 
leaves,  and  Brasseur  6 * * * * speaks  of  it  as  the  most  beautiful  of  all  the  MSS.  in  execution,  but  the  one  which  has 
suffered  the  most  from  time  and  usage.6 


CODEX  PEREZIANUS* 


1  It  constitutes  vol.  ii.  and  iii.  of  the  series. 

Mission  scientifique  au  Mkxique  et  dans  PA  intrigue 

Centrale.  Ouvrages  publics  par  ordre  de  V E viper eur  et 
paries  soitis  du  Ministre  de  V Instruction  publique  (Paris, 

1868-70),  under  the  distinctive  title  : Linguistiquey  Manus- 
crit Troano.  Etudes  sur  le  systhne  graphique  et  la  langue 
des  Mayas , par  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg  (1869-70). 

Rosny,  who  compared  Brasseurs  edition  with  the  orig- 
inal, was  satisfied  with  its  exactness,  except  in  the  number- 

ing of  the  leaves;  and  Brasseur  (Bibl.  Mex.-Guat .,  1871) 
confessed  that  in  his  interpretation  he  had  read  the  MS. 

backwards.  The  work  was  reissued  in  Paris  in  1872,  with- 
out the  plates,  under  the  following  title : Dictionnairey 

Granunaire  et  Chrestoniathie  de  la  langue  may  a,  precedes 
d'une  etude  sur  les  systhne  graphique  des  indigenes  du 

Yucatan  ( Mlxiquc ) (Paris,  1872). 

Brasseurs  Rapport,  addresst  h son  Excellence  M.  Duruy , 
included  in  the  work,  gives  briefly  the  abba’s  exposition  of 
the  MS.  Professor  Cyrus  Thomas  and  Dr.  D.  G.  Brinton, 

having  printed  some  expositions  in  the  American  Natu- 
ralist (vol.  xv.)  united  in  an  essay  making  vc1.  v.  of  the  Con- 
tributions to  North  American  Ethnology  (Powell’s  survey) 
under  the  title  : A Study  of  the  Manuscript  Troano  by 
Cyrus  Thomas , with  an  introduction  by  D G.  Brinton 


(Washington,  1882),  which  gives  fac-similes  of  some  of  the 
plates.  Thomas  calls  it  a kind  of  religious  calendar,  giving 
dates  of  religious  festivals  through  a long  period,  intermixed 
with  illustratious  of  the  habits  and  employments  of  the 
people,  their  houses,  dress,  utensils.  He  calls  the  charac- 
ters in  a measure  phonetic,  and  not  syllabic.  Cf.  Rosny 
in  the  Archives  de  la  Soc.  Am.  de  France , n.  s.,  ii.  28; 
his  Essai  sur  le  dechiffrement , etc.  (1876) ; Powell’s  Third 
Kept.  Bur.  of  Eth.,  xvi.  ; Bancroft's  Nat.  Races , ii.  774; 
and  Brinton’s  A otes  on  tpe  Codex  Troano  and  Maya 
Chronology  (Salem,  1881). 

2 Cf.  Science , iii.  458. 

3 Codex  Cortesianus.  Manuscrit  hieratique  des  an- 
ciens  Indiens  de  P Amcrique  centrale  conserve  au  Musee 
archeologiquc  de  Madrid.  Photographic  et  publie  pour  la 
premibre  fois , avec  une  introduction , et  un  vocabidaire  de 
Pecriture  hieratique  yucateque  par  Leon  de  Rosny  (Paris, 
1883).  At  the  end  is  a list  of  works  by  De  Rosny  on  Amer- 
ican archaeology  and  paleography. 

4 Archives  de  la  Soc.  Am.de  France , n.  s.,  ii.  25. 

5 Bib.  Mex.-Guat .,  p.  95. 

G Cf.  Rosny  in  Archives  pattographiques  (Paris,  1869- 
71),  pi.  1 17,  etc. ; and  his  Essai  sur  le  dechiffrement , etc., 
pi.  viii. , xvi. 


* One  of  the  leaves  of  a MS.  No.  2,  in  the  Bibliotheque  Nationale,  Paris,  following  the  fac-simile  (pi.  124)  in  Leon 
de  Rosny’s  Archives paleographiques  (Paris,  1869). 


Note.  — This  Yucatan  bas-relief  follows  a photograph  by  Rosny  (1880),  reproduced  in  the  Mem.  de  la  Soc.  eTEthno - 
graphic,  no.  3 (Paris,  1882). 


\ 


. 


* 


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